LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF 
WILLIAM   TAYLOR    BAKER 


LIFE    AND    CHARACTER 

OF 

WILLIAM    TAYLOR    BAKER 


I9OI,  AGE    6O 


LIFE  AND   CHARACTER 


OF 


WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 


PRESIDENT    OF   THE 

WORLD'S    COLUMBIAN    EXPOSITION 

AND   OF  THE 

CHICAGO   BOARD   OF  TRADE 


BY  HIS  SON 

CHARLES  H.  BAKER 


WITH    ILLUSTRATIONS 


NEW  YORK 

THE    PREMIER   PRESS 
1908 


AUTHOR'S  NOTE. 

THREE  hundred  copies  of  this  book  have  been 
printed  for  gratuitous  distribution  among  the 
friends  of  William  T.  Baker,  in  the  belief  that 
those  who  knew  him  intimately  in  life  would  value 
highly  this  brief  story  of  his  career.  If  any  have  been 
overlooked,  it  was  unintentional  on  the  part  of  those 
few  of  his  intimate  friends  who  made  up  the  list  of 
names  to  whom  copies  have  been  presented  by  the 
author,  and  from  whom  prompt  acknowledgment  is 
requested  in  order  that  the  safe  delivery  of  the  books 
may  be  noted. 


F 


DOROTHY 


DEDICATION 

TO  you,  my  little  daughter  Dorothy,  your  Daddy 
dedicates    this    book.      I    do    so   because   your 
Grandpa  loved  you  from  the  day  you  first  came 
into    the   world   on   his   birthday   until   the   day   he 
went  out  of  it,  and  he  loves  you  still.     He  loves  you 
because  you  came  down  from  him  and  are  of  him; — 
but  he  loves  you  most  because  it  is  you,  just  as  he 
would  a  flower,  because  it  is  a  flower — because  it  is 
pretty  and  sweet.  God-given  and  inspiring. 


211 

(*«KV> 


PREFACE 

"We  should  look  at  the  lives  of  all  as  at  a  mirror,  and 
take  from  others  an  example  for  ourselves."— 


THE  idea  of  this  book  first  came  into  my  mind  as 
a  medium  for  giving  to  my  children  a  picture  of  a 
character  worthy  of  their  emulation,  by  placing 
them  in  close  touch  with  the  life  and  character  of  a 
real  person  of  their  own  blood,  who  had  lived  a  whole- 
some, useful  and  honorable  life,  and  had  added  more 
than  one  man's  share  to  the  world's  work.  By  reading 
of  my  father's  life,  and  letting  him  dwell  in  spirit 
with  them,  his  grandchildren  and  his  posterity  will 
find  inspiration  and  encouragement  for  better  and 
more  useful  living  and  for  greater  accomplishment, 
although  his  name  would  live  without  this  book.  This 
story  I  had  thought  to  make  up  in  a  few  typewritten 
copies  for  the  restricted  use  related,  but  I  soon  found 
while  gathering  my  data  together,  that  many  outside 
of  kinship  claimed  the  right  to  a  copy,  and  hence  the 
printed  book. 

The  preparation  of  this  biography  during  my  spare 
moments  of  the  last  two  years  has  been  a  most  pleas- 
ant task  although  it  has  been  fraught  with  difficulties 
and  discouragement,  owing  to  the  fact  that  it  is 
founded  more  upon  the  personal  recollections  of  people 
than  upon  documentary  evidence.  The  older  gener- 
ation from  whom  I  might  draw,  has  gone,  or  else 
its  remnants  are  falling  like  autumnal  leaves  and 
have  only  hazy  memories  of  the  past.  The  newer  gen- 
eration knew  him  only  in  his  later  life  and  cannot  tell 


of  him  as  a  young  man  or  boy.  No  relatives  except 
his  children  and  a  younger  brother  survive  him. 
There  are  those  still  living  in  the  three  little  New 
York  villages,  where  I  recently  visited  for  the  pur- 
poses of  this  biography,  who  lived  there  when  he  did 
as  a  boy  before  the  villages  grew  too  small  for  him, 
but  they,  naturally  enough,  with  dulled  memories,  do 
not  recollect  much  about  him.  There  are  others  who 
were  his  playmates  and  associates,  and  a  sweetheart 
or  two  who  survive  him  and  remember  him  well,  and 
to  these  as  well  as  to  reminiscences  by  himself  and 
such  as  I  remember  of  his  telling,  I  look  largely  for 
the  story  of  his  early  life.  To  all  those  friends  of  my 
father  and  myself  who  have  so  kindly  and  earnestly 
assisted  me  in  gathering  the  material  for  this 
biography,  I  extend  my  grateful  appreciation. 

In  telling  this  story,  I  have  tried  to  do  so  without 
any  coloring  or  prejudice,  so  as  to  display  my  father 
in  the  light  of  cold  facts  as  he  was — no  better  and  no 
worse,  as  he  himself  always  wished  to  be  considered. 
If,  therefore,  I  have  seemingly  made  a  hero  out  of  him 
where  moderation  would  have  done,  I  beg  as  my 
excuse  that  I  had  a  father  of  whom  I  was  justly 
proud  and  whom  I  loved  without  reserve — so  that  I 
saw  him  from  a  different  viewpoint  than  others  did— 
that's  all. 

CHARLES  H.  BAKER. 

100  Broadway,  New  York  City. 
January  I,  1908. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTERS  PAGE 

Author's  Note 4 

Dedication   5 

Preface 7 

I.     Boyhood  Life  in  West  Winfield,  1841-1855 13 

II.     As  a  Youth  in  Groton  and  McLean,  1855-1861.  .  .  27 

III.  Career  in  Chicago,  1861-1903 41 

IV.  Eliza  Annie  Dunster,  1838-1873 83 

V.     Chicago  Board  of  Trade,  1890-1897 Ill 

VI.     World's  Columbian  Exposition,  1890-1893 153 

VII.     The  Civic  Federation,  1895-1897 165 

VIII.     Snoqualmie  Falls  and  White  River  Power  Develop- 
ments, 1887-1904 175 

IX.     Art  Institute  of  Chicago,  1878-1903 267 

X.     Home  Life  and  Character.  .                                      .  273 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

William  Taylor  Baker Frontispiece 

Dorothy   Page       5 

West  Winfield,  New  York Facing  "         13 

Birthplace  of  William  Taylor  Baker "  18 

Rural  Scene  at  West  Winfield "  18 

Cobble  Stone  School  House,  West  Winfield,      "  18 

Mother  of  William  Taylor  Baker "  22 

William  Taylor  Baker,  Aged  8  Years "  22 

In  This  Store  My  Father  Worked  as  a  Boy 

at  Groton,  New  York "  27 

Village  Hotel,  Groton,  New  York "  27 

Millpond  and  Swimming  Pool  at  McLean. .  .  34 

Residence  of  Mr.  Marsh,  at  McLean "  34 

Village  of  McLean,  New  York "  38 

William  Taylor  Baker   (four  portraits) "  41 

Cartoon,  "The  Wheat  Kings" "         71 

The  Chicago  Homestead Facing  "         74 

Anna  Franklin  (Phipps)   (Morgan)  Baker.  .      "  78 

Exmoor  Cottage — The  Summer  Home "  78 

Grave  of  Henry  Dunster "  83 

Birthplace  of  Eliza  Annie  Dunster "  83 

The  Original  Bradford  Academy,  1858 "  83 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS — Continued 

Samuel  Dunster Facing  Page  100 

Eliza  Annie  (Dunster)  Baker "  "  100 

Grandchildren  of  William  Taylor  Baker.  ...      "  "  100 

The  Dunster  Farmhouse  near  Attleboro,  Mass.      "  "  106 

Chicago  Board  of  Trade,  "The  Pit" "  "  111 

Cartoon,  "Scenes  at  the  Polls" "  132 

Cartoon,  "Gov.  Tanner's  'Monte  Carlo'  " "  146 

World's    Columbian  Exposition 

The  Court    of    Honor Facing  "  153 

Administration  Building "  "  160 

Snoqualmie  Falls,  Height  270  Feet "  "  175 

Subterranean  19,000  H.  P.  Generating  Plant.      "  "  175 

Longitudinal  Section,  Snoqualmie  Power  Plant  192 

Constructing  Dam  Above  Snoqualmie  Falls.      "  "  192 

Diagram  of  Power  Distribution "  193 

Seattle  Substation  and  General  Offices Facing  "  198 

Tacoma    Substation "  "  198 

Centennial   Mill "  "  224 

White  River  Power  Plant "  "  224 

Cartoon,  "Charge  of  the  Light  Brigade" "  236 

Cartoon,  "Grand  Hypnotic  Exhibition  at  City  Hall" .  "  253 

Art  Institute  of  Chicago Facing  "  267 

Glimpses  of  My  Father  at  Exmoor "  "  273 

The  Baker  Lot  in  Graceland.  .  "  293 


c 

Q 

~   z 


CHAPTER  I 

BOYHOOD  LIFE  IN  WEST  WIN-FIELD 
1841-1855 

NOTHING  appears  to  be  known  of  this  par- 
ticular Baker  family  prior  to  my  grandfather, 
who  was  William  Baker,  born  in  Bradford, 
England,  about  1799.  In  that  country,  he  was  a  baker 
by  trade  as  well  as  by  name,  and  he  had  been  a  butcher 
too.  He  came  to  this  country  in  1838  and  drifted  to 
West  Winfield,  a  small  village  of  about  one  hundred 
and  fifty  people,  in  Herkimer  County,  New  York. 
Here  he  made  a  pretence  of  earning  a  livelihood,  by 
doing  chores  about  the  village,  acting  as  porter  and 
hostler  to  the  village  inn,  and  working  upon  the  neigh- 
borhood farms.  He  is  remembered  as  a  man  who  was 
not  always  sober,  which  fact  to  some  extent  at  least 
undermined  his  usefulness.  Yet  notwithstanding  his 
shortcomings,  he  was  in  some  respects,  a  remarkable 
character.  He  was  a  man  of  good  address,  and  well 
groomed  considering  his  circumstances.  He  was  well 
versed  in  the  current  topics  of  the  day  and  was  con- 
sidered an  authority  in  the  village  upon  political, 
scientific  and  social  subjects  pertaining  to  any  part  of 
the  world  that  excited  ordinary  interest.  He  was  a 
reader  of  many  books  and  papers,  chiefly  historical, 
and  so  in  a  way  was  scholarly,  deep  and  intellectual, 


.  14  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

although  without  the  fundamental  advantages  of  very 
much  school  education.    He  could  talk  and  tell  stories 
better  than  any  one  in  the  village,  and  so  he  was  enter- 
taining, not  only  because  of  a  certain  fluency  of  speech 
and  pleasing  diction,  but  because  of  a  well  developed 
sense  of  humor.    But  in  this  grandsire  of  mine,  there 
was  something  lacking  to  make  a  complete  man  of 
him.    He  seemed  not  to  be  able  to  put  out  an  anchor 
that  would  hold.    In  commercial  and  financial  instinct 
he  apparently  was  a  void.    He  wras  not  religious.    He 
lacked  the  capacity  to  find  profitable  work  or  to  do  it 
well  if  he  found  it.     The  knack  of  getting  on  in  the 
world  was  not  his,  and  so  he  was  unsettled  and  shift- 
less, obstinate  in  disposition,   and  not  fixed  in  any 
purpose  except  to  be  agreeable  around  the  village  inn 
and  drown  his  discontent  in  the  flowing  bowl. 
"A  man  so  various,  that  he  seemed  to  be 
Not  one,  but  all  mankind's  epitome ; 
Stiff  in  opinion,  always  in  the  wrong, 
Was  everything  by  starts,  and  nothing  long  ; 
But  in  the  course  of  one  revolving  moon. 
Was  chymist,  fiddler,  statesman  and  buffoon." 

— Dry  den. 

There  lived  in  West  Winfield,  about  this  time,  a 
sterling  widow,  Mrs.  Williams,  who  as  a  maiden  was 
Matilda  Taylor,  and  she  was  born  in  Stonington, 
Connecticut,  on  the  loth  of  May,  1801.  Her  husband, 
Ralph  Williams,  had  been  a  thrifty  farmer,  attending 
to  his  business  and  providing  amply  for  his  family. 
He  died  with  but  small  estate  after  there  had  been 
three  children.  These  children  were: — Samuel  G. 


BOYHOOD  LIFE  IN  WEST  WINFIELD         15 

Williams,  who  in  his  later  life  became  Professor  of 
Geology  in  Cornell  University;  Ralph  B.  Williams, 
who  became  Secretary  of  the  Groton  Bridge  Company, 
of  Groton,  N.  Y.,  and  Minnie  Williams,  who  became 
Mrs.  Charles  Perrigo,  of  Groton,  N.  Y.  A  small 
house  was  purchased  with  the  diminutive  fortune  of 
her  deceased  husband  and  here  the  family  lived  as 
long  as  they  remained  in  the  village.  Then  it  came 
about  that  Mrs.  Williams  married  my  grandfather 
William  Baker,  and  to  them  came  children  in  the 
following  order,  all  born  in  her  homestead: — Alfred 
Baker,  William  Taylor  Baker,  my  father,  Eliza  Baker 
and  George  Henry  Baker,  the  last  named  being  the 
only  one  now  living,  and  who  is  successfully  engaged 
in  the  butcher's  trade  at  Ithaca,  N.  Y. 

What  brought  my  grandparents  together  as  a  mar- 
ried pair  is  hardly  decypherable  at  this  late  time.  Per- 
haps he  wanted  shelter  over  his  head  which  she  was 
already  able  to  provide.  Perhaps  she  wanted  some- 
one to  talk  to  or  to  help  around  the  garden  and  house, 
or  perhaps  they  loved  each  other, — who  knows?  At 
any  rate,  they  decided  to  live  their  lives  together. 
Now,  inasmuch  as  she  was  a  deep  dyed  Methodist 
who  believed  devoutedly  in  hellfire  and  brimstone  for 
those  who  wandered  from  the  straight  and  narrow 
path  and  heaven  for  those  who  did  not  do  so,  she  of 
course,  believed  in  cold  water  in  preference  to  alcohol, 
and  so  probably  grew  to  have  less  esteem  for  her 
husband  than  she  would  have  had,  had  he  been  as 
virtuous  as  she.  She  possessed  the  highest  order  of 


16  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

thrift,  intelligence,  nerve,  good  sense,  morality  and 
spirituality.  She  was  what  he  was  not.  His  inten- 
tions were  good,  but  he  failed  to  fulfill  them.  He 
only  helped  support  his  family,  but  that  was  not 
enough  when  the  number  of  little  hungry  mouths  was 
increasing  every  year.  So  she  learned  the  trade  of 
tailoress  and  worked  early  and  late  at  such  times  as 
she  could  spare  from  her  children,  at  making  clothes 
by  hand,  for  sewing  machines  were  not  thought  of 
then. 

Thus  it  was  that  my  grandfather  and  grandmother 
got  on  together,  like  oil  and  water.  So  it  was  natural 
enough  that  they  should  go  their  own  ways  independ- 
ently, he  resigning  her  to  the  task  of  bringing  up  the 
children,  and  she  resigning  him  to  a  job  on  a  farm 
near  Winfield,  where  he  died  January  4th,  1870.  He 
was  buried  in  the  village  cemetery,  where  his  grand- 
children have  provided  a  suitable  stone  to  mark  his 
resting  place. 

Grandmother  Baker  lived  to  be  eighty-one  years 
old  and  died  in  Groton,  N.  Y.,  November  I5th,  1882, 
where  she  had  lived  the  latter  part  of  her  life.  Her 
children  claim  that  the  good  in  them  came  from  her, 
either  by  direct  inheritance  or  by  the  training  with 
which  she  followed  it  up.  This  undoubtedly  is  true 
to  a  large  extent,  and  yet  in  my  father's  case,  as  I 
see  him,  he  drew  from  both  his  parents,  and  as  the 
composite  of  the  best  in  them  both,  he  developed  into 
the  really  great  man  as  we  know  him.  But  what 
great  man  ever  lived  who  did  not  have  a  great  mother  ? 


BOYHOOD  LIFE  IN  WEST  WINFIELD         17 

Not  necessarily  great  in  the  glamour  of  world  history, 
but  great  in  the  undisclosed  measure  of  us  all  as  we 
finally  appear  before  the  last  Tribunal.  Is  it  not  reas- 
onable that  it  should  be  so,  for  who  but  the  mother 
gives  to  the  child  directly  that  which  was  of  herself? 
And  so  in  recognition  of  this,  and  of  my  father's  devo- 
tion to  his  mother,  I  place  her  as  a  character  of  the 
first  order  in  this  book  which  tells  his  story. 

The  situation  in  the  Baker  household  as  I  have 
portrayed  it,  had  its  logical  outcome,  and  so  the  family 
old  and  young,  big  and  little,  had  to  scatter  and  face 
the  world  upon  their  individual  resources.  Maybe 
this  situation  in  life  was  a  good  thing  for  the  subject 
of  this  sketch,  as  it  put  him  on  his  mettle.  But  the 
embryo  of  greatness  was  in  him  anyway  and  would 
undoubtedly  have  developed  in  true  Rooseveltian 
fashion  even  though  the  vicissitudes  of  life  and  pov- 
erty had  not  spurred  him  to  his  best  efforts. 

William  Taylor  Baker  was  born  in  West  Winfield, 
Herkimer  County,  New  York,  September  nth,  1841, 
and  he  lived  there  until  his  fourteenth  year.  He  was 
given  his  father's  Christian  name  and  his  mother's 
maiden  name.  Just  what  he  was  and  what  he  did 
there  until  he  was  fourteen  years  old,  I  have  been 
unable  to  discover  much  about,  although  I  doubt  not 
that  as  a  baby  he  was  one  of  the  precocious  kind,  who 
sit  up  in  their  cradles  to  better  view  the  surroundings, 
who  try  to  invent  improvements  in  their  cradles,  or 
trade  them  for  something  better  or  something  more 
to  eat,  and  who  manage  their  mothers  with  an  assumed 


18  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

authority  which  is  seldom  disputed.  At  least,  I  justify 
my  theory  upon  the  hypothesis  that  what  he  after- 
wards became,  had  its  beginning  in  the  cradle  in  his 
first  year.  He  grew  to  be  a  freckled  faced  boy,  lively 
and  wide  awake  in  every  way  and  was  the  favorite 
brother  of  his  older  sister  Minnie,  who  had  much  to 
do  in  helping  their  mother  to  bring  him  up.  He  was 
slight  in  build  and  not  overly  robust  physically, 
although  all  people  who  dicuss  him  at  that  stage  of 
his  life,  tell  of  his  active  and  very  earnest  mind  and 
his  spirited  and  happy  disposition.  He  was  also  a 
bad  boy  when  he  wanted  to  be  but  only  to  a  degree 
made  necessary  by  the  fact  that  he  was  a  boy.  The 
Baptist  Church  stands  next  to  his  mother's  house.  It 
did  then  and  it  does  now,  although  the  little  old  wooden 
one  has  given  place  to  a  new  one  of  brick.  "Billy 
Baker"  as  they  called  him  had  grown  rich  enough  in 
his  own  right  and  through  his  small  earnings  at  odd 
times  to  own  a  powerful  pistol.  With  this  he  shot  holes 
through  the  walls  of  the  church,  and  the  bombard- 
ment caused  the  plaster  to  fall  on  the  pulpit  and  in 
the  pews,  and  prompted  his  mother  to  whip  him  until 
he  was  humble  enough  to  beg  forgiveness  from  the 
preacher.  And  then  again  at  one  time  he  issued  a 
declaration  of  independence  in  favor  of  himself  and 
against  home  and  mother,  and  apprenticed  himself 
out  to  be  a  carpenter  until  the  time  of  his  majority, 
which  was  only  a  dozen  of  years  ahead.  But  he  was 
not  long  at  work  in  his  chosen  profession  before  he 
saw  his  father  coming  down  the  road  in  the  distance 


BIRTHPLACE  OF  WILLIAM   TAYLOR  BAKER. 


RURAL  SCENE  AT  WEST  WINFIELD. 


COBBLE  STONE  SCHOOL  HOUSE,  WEST  WTNFIELD. 


BOYHOOD  LIFE  IN  WEST  WINFIELD         19 

wearing  a  stern  look  and  a  strap  which  meant  a 
licking,  so  he  deserted  his  new  master  and  went  back 
home  by  a  round  about  way.  He  did  not  apprentice 
himself  out  again.  It  was  natural  enough  that  he 
should  have  gravitated  to  a  carpenter's  shop,  for  he 
was  clever  with  his  hands  and  could  whittle  skillfully 
with  his  jackknife,  and  do  other  things  which  he  liked 
to  do.  He  could  build  little  railroads  around  in  his 
mother's  garden,  shaping  up  the  earth  into  miniature 
railroad  grades,  crossing  little  imaginary  rivers  on 
bridges  and  running  his  lines  under  the  current  bushes 
for  forests  and  through  tunnels  under  hand  made 
mountains.  Construction  operations  came  natural  to 
him  at  that  time.  So  also  was  trading,  and  his  jack- 
knife  was  apt  to  be  a  better  one  than  the  one  he  traded 
off  for  it.  Even  when  a  grown  man  he  liked  to  work 
with  tools  and  study  plans  and  watch  construction, 
and  this  instinct,  together  with  his  liking  and  aptitude 
for  business  were  the  fundamental  elements  under- 
lying his  future  career. 

This  same  Billy  Baker  was  good  to  his  mother 
and  sisters  as  were  the  other  brothers.  He 
helped  his  mother  in  the  work  about  the  place, 
and  he  did  chores  around  the  village;  also  such 
farm  work  as  a  boy  could  do,  and  there  wasn't 
much  about  a  farm  a  boy  could  not  do  or  was  not 
made  to  do  in  those  days.  He  could  tread  hay,  and 
guide  the  horse  riding  bareback  in  front  of  the  plow 
or  cultivator  in  the  corn  field,  and  he  took  the  cow 
out  in  the  morning  and  brought  her  back  at  night  and 


20          LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

milked  her;  and  he  didn't  often  aim  at  spots  or  flies 
on  the  wall  with  the  thin  white  filaments,  unless  some 
one  was  around  to  be  entertained  thereby,  for  milk 
in  those  days  was  food,  and  it  was  not  right  to  waste 
food  while  mother  had  to  work. 

My  father  often  said  he  only  had  one  year's  school- 
ing in  his  life,  and  this  was  at  the  little  cobblestone 
district  school  house  in  West  Winfield,  which  has  since 
been  torn  down.  I  was  fortunate,  however,  in  being 
able  to  secure  a  picture  of  it  as  shown  in  this 
book.  He  stood  at  the  head  of  the  school  and  I  sup- 
pose he  learned  all  they  had  to  teach  him,  for  such 
schools  in  those  days  did  not  have  much  learning  to 
dispense.  And  yet  with  this  primitive  and  limited 
inoculation  of  erudition,  see  the  manner  of  man  he 
eventuated  into  finally !  Who  would  know  in  talking 
with  him  and  listening  to  him  as  we  saw  him  last, 
but  what  he  had  taken  several  degrees  in  some  of  the 
great  universities?  Where  could  be  found  a  more 
cultured  gentleman?  Or  one  more  impressive  and 
scholarly?  Notwithstanding  however  his  restricted 
opportunities,  he  was  very  studious,  and  read  books 
in  his  idle  hours  from  the  time  he  first  learned  to  read, 
and  particularly  historical  books.  He  was  an  authority 
upon  the  life  of  Napoleon  Bonaparte  and  knew  him 
through  and  through  as  a  historical  character,  and 
he  delivered  lectures  on  the  subject  to  the  boys  of  the 
village.  I  suspect  that  he  took  his  cue  in  life  from 
Napoleon,  for  most  boys  usually  set  up  in  their  minds 
a  model  to  follow  and  he  evidently  chose  Napoleon  for 


BOYHOOD  LIFE  IN  WEST  WINFIELD         21 

his,  and  unconsciously  took  on  many  of  his  stronger 
attributes.  He  was  a  most  ardent  admirer  of  the 
great  French  hero,  and  proclaimed  his  genius  and 
virtues  upon  every  suitable  occasion,  condoning  his 
shortcomings  like  a  champion,  and  sympathizing  with 
him  in  his  reverses.  A  schoolmate  of  his  remembers 
him  saying — "How  very  unjust  it  is  to  Napoleon's 
memory  for  the  people  to  consider  the  reverses  and 
the  record  of  his  last  years  of  life  as  the  just  measure 
of  his  whole  career." 

The  brief  schooling  which  Father  got  in  West  Win- 
field,  inadequate  as  it  was,  had  to  be  discontinued  when 
the  necessities  of  the  family  compelled  him  to  do 
something  to  assist  in  his  and  their  support ;  therefore, 
when  he  was  about  fourteen  years  old,  he  went  to 
work  for  Julius  Bisby,  who  owned  the  country  store 
in  the  village.  His  duties  consisted  in  measuring  out 
calico,  beans,  vinegar,  tobacco,  candy  and  other  things 
to  the  villagers  and  farmers,  and  in  helping  to  keep 
the  books  of  the  establishment,  always  first  on  the 
scene  in  the  morning  to  open  the  store  in  order  to 
sweep  it  out  and  get  ready  for  business.  This  he  did 
all  day  and  every  day,  excepting  Sundays,  and  he 
devoted  himself  largely  to  reading  and  studying  in 
the  evenings.  The  fact  that  his  mother  was  an  ortho- 
dox Christian  who  believed  in  heaven  and  hell  and  no 
middle  situation  for  departed  souls,  scared  him  and 
the  other  children  into  keeping  in  the  straight  path. 
Under  the  threat  of  eternal  damnation,  she  invoked 
their  obedience  to  the  ordinary  and  accepted  code  of 


22  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

morals,  with  the  promise  that  such  obedience  would 
eventually  make  white  winged  angels  of  them;  and 
they  all  looked  forward  to  becoming  angels.  Father 
was  not  a  churchman,  due  doubtless  to  the  over  drastic 
religious  teachings  of  his  mother  with  which  he  was 
not  in  accord,  for  although  he  was  a  Christian  gentle- 
man and  reverently  believed  in  God  and  the  hereafter, 
he  was  inclined  to  be  liberal  in  his  views  and  to  suffer 
himself  to  be  guided  by  the  teachings  of  his  own 
conscience,  rather  than  by  the  precepts  and  the  stric- 
tures of  an  old  fashioned  and  narrow  school  of 
religion. 

My  father  as  a  boy,  and  in  fact  throughout  his 
development,  looked  like  his  father,  but  his  tempera- 
ment, disposition  and  character  have  been  drawn  more 
largely  from  his  estimable  mother.  I  did  not  learn 
that  he  was  athletic  in  the  way  that  country  boys  are 
apt  to  be,  or  that  he  had  had  recorded  to  his  credit  any 
victories  in  pugilistic  encounters  with  the  village  boys. 
His  fighting  tendencies  seem  to  have  been  developed 
more  in  a  mental  capacity  than  physical,  and  every 
one  with  whom  he  came  in  contact  in  matters  of  debate 
or  clash  of  wits  got  worsted.  Such  encounters  he 
seemed  to  have  sought,  as  being  much  to  his  liking. 
He  evidently  had,  however,  a  pair  of  fine  arms,  for 
they  tell  of  his  liking  to  roll  up  his  sleeves  and  display 
their  good  form  and  grace  with  their  muscles  in 
tension,  and  this  show  of  physical  excellence  seems  to 
be  about  the  only  demonstration  which  he  was  in 
the  habit  of  making. 


MATILDA  TAYLOR  BAKER — AGED  70. 
MOTHER  OF  WM.   T.   BAKER. 


WM.  T.  BAKER,   1849— AGED  8. 

HIS     BROTHER     AND     SISTER     ON     EITHER     SIDE. 


BOYHOOD  LIFE  IN  WEST  WINFIELD         23 

The  year  of  service  in  the  country  store  paid  him 
well  in  experience  but  little  in  money.  How  well  this 
particular  first  business  engagement  in  his  life  paid 
him,  I  was  unable  to  ascertain  from  his  contemporaries 
now  living,  although  I  was  more  successful  in  the  two 
succeeding  villages  to  which  he  migrated  later.  He 
probably  did  not  earn  over  a  dollar  a  week.  He  slept 
under  the  counter  in  the  store,  not  only  for  the  purpose 
of  being  the  first  on  hand  in  the  morning,  in  order  to 
clear  the  decks  for  business,  but  as  a  sort  of  watch 
dog  of  the  supplies  which  were  kept  in  the  store.  In 
fact,  it  was  common  in  those  days  to  shut  a  dog  up  in 
a  store  at  night  with  liberty  to  roam  about  and  attack 
intruders,  or  else  to  have  a  boy  sleep  there  to  perform 
the  same  duty,  for  it  was  common  for  thieves  to 
attempt  to  pillage  such  places,  in  order  to  supply  their 
needs  without  rendering  the  usual  equivalent  there- 
for. 

His  mother,  as  I  have  stated,  was  industrious  from 
morning  to  night  in  the  care  of  her  children  and  in 
the  doing  of  tailoring  work  for  their  support,  while 
their  father  spent  much  of  his  time  as  an  idle  orna- 
ment about  the  place,  or  the  village  rendezvous.  She 
worked  after  the  sun  set  in  order  to  accomplish  more, 
and  these  late  hours  had  to  be  illuminated  by  the  light 
of  tallow  dips  or  candles,  which  were  in  vogue  before 
the  invention  of  kerosene  oil.  Then  came  the  cam- 
phine  lamps,  no  larger  nor  no  better  than  the  tallow 
dip,  and  finally  in  the  evolution  of  artificial  illumina- 
tion as  the  country  grew,  kerosene  oil  and  lamps  to 


24  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

use  it  came  into  practice.  Father,  ever  devoted  to 
his  mother,  and  solicitous  for  her  welfare,  immedi- 
ately bought  from  his  savings  a  primitive  kerosene 
lamp,  to  conserve  his  mother's  eyes ; — and  for  the  pur- 
pose of  operating  it,  he  supplied  her  with  a  gallon  of 
kerosene  oil,  which  bore  a  red  color  in  those  days,  and 
which  cost  him  $1.25. 

The  village  of  West  Winfield  is  sixteen  miles  south 
of  Utica,  which  was  the  nearest  railway  station  at 
that  time  (1855)  and  accessible  by  a  stage  running 
daily.  The  village  contained  a  bank,  a  weekly  paper, 
a  Methodist  and  a  Baptist  church,  a  tannery  and  two 
grist  mills.  The  fifty  years  since  then  has  not  any 
more  than  doubled  its  population.  There  are  now 
about  four  or  five  hundred  people  there  and  in  that 
vicinity.  Father  never  went  back  to  his  native  village 
after  he  left  it  as  a  boy,  and  I  often  wonder  that  neither 
sentiment  nor  curiosity  ever  impelled  him  to  do  so. 
I  went  there  last  summer  and  tramped  over  every 
inch  of  ground  that  he  did.  All  I  needed  to  do  was  to 
roll  back  half  a  century  of  years  and  imagine  that  I 
was  the  real  and  original  Billy.  It  thrilled  me  to  do 
so.  It  filled  me  with  unspeakable  joy  just  to  sleep  one 
night  as  I  did  there  in  the  same  night  stillness,  to  be 
lulled  to  my  dreams  by  the  same  cricket  and  katydid, 
to  see  the  same  houses  and  the  same  trees — now  more 
stately  with  age,  to  stand  by  the  same  mill  pond  where 
he  went  swimming  and  fishing,  to  see  the  same  pretty 
girls  flirting  and  gossiping  with  the  same  ruddy  boys, 
to  tramp  on  the  same  dusty  road  and  to  gaze  at  the 


BOYHOOD  LIFE  IN  WEST  WINFIELD         25 

same  beautiful  hills  and  valleys.  Yes,  all  just  the 
same  as  when  he  was  there,  only,  with  fresh  crickets, 
katydids  and  girls  to  take  the  place  of  those  which 
had  gone  down  the  corridors  of  time.  I  knocked  at 
the  door  of  the  very  house  in  which  he  was  born; — 
little,  humble,  and  old  it  is.  I  told  them  who  I  was 
and  that  I  had  come  after  fifty  years  to  see  the  place 
where  he  had  been.  They  respected  my  errand  and 
allowed  me  to  go  all  through  it,  in  every  nook  and 
corner, — apologizing  for  appearances,  as  they  said 
they  had  not  expected  visitors; — up  the  creaky  stairs 
with  the  same  thin  and  rickety  railing,  and  in  the 
little  room,  the  very  identical  little  room,  where  he 
came  into  being.  In  my  imagination,  I  could  hear 
the  baby  cry  and  could  see  its  mother's  look  of  tender 
love  and  pride  for  the  new  come  joy.  And  then  I 
left,  and  as  I  went  off  down  the  street,  I  looked  back 
again  and  again  where  little  Billy  had  been,  and  won- 
dered if  he  from  the  Great  Beyond  could  then  see 
me  and  feel  my  great  love  for  him  as  I  stood  there 
transfixed  in  the  contemplation  of  the  spirits  of  the 
past,  and  feeling  for  the  moment  that  I  too  was  a 
little  boy  myself,  waiting — waiting  for  him  to  come 
out  who  never  could  come  again. 


IN  THIS  STORE  MY  FATHER  WORKED  AS  A  BOY,  AT  GROTON,  N.  Y. 


VILLAGE  HOTEL,  GROTON,  N    Y. 

WHERE    THE    DANCES    WERE    HELD. 


CHAPTER  II 

AS   A  YOUTH   IN   GROTON   AND   McLEAN 

1855-1861 

WITH  his  education  apparently  completed  at 
the  age  of  thirteen  and  having  completed  a 
preliminary  business  career  of  one  year  as 
related  at  the  age  of  fourteen,  Father  grew  too  big 
for  West  Winfield  and  resolved  to  seek  a  larger  and 
more  inviting  field.  The  vilage  of  Groton,  Tompkins 
County,  New  York,  of  about  four  or  five  hundred 
people,  and  ninety  miles  from  Winfield  to  the  south- 
west, was  the  place  which  attracted  him ;  probably  for 
the  reason  that  he  had  a  better  opportunity,  but 
undoubtedly  for  the  principal  reason  that  his  older 
brother,  Professor  Williams,  was  in  that  village  teach- 
ing the  only  school  in  the  place,  namely  the  Groton 
Academy.  Thither  he  went  without  his  mother,  and 
because  of  his  brother's  connection  with  the  school 
he  was  able  to  get  free  the  schooling,  which  otherwise 
would  have  cost  him  $21.00  per  year.  In  the  same 
school  his  brother  Ralph  was  janitor  and  his  sister 
Minnie  was  also  a  student,  so  that  the  family  as  a 
whole  were  an  important  factor  in  educational  matters 
in  Groton.  There  were  no  railroads  running  to  Groton 
nor  within  fifty  miles  of  it,  so  Father  may  have 
tramped  it  in  reaching  there,  or  staged  it,  or  got  a 


28  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

lift  in  some  farmer's  wagon.  The  village  had  a 
machine  shop  and  foundry,  and  having  more  stores 
and  houses,  was  more  pretentious  generally  than 
West  Winneld. 

Father  went  to  work  as  clerk  for  Styles  Berry,  who 
ran  a  general  store  in  Groton,  and  served  for  a  period 
of  six  months.  Some  say  that  Berry  was  the  meanest 
man  in  Groton  village  and  much  too  close  with  his 
money,  and  consequently  Father  was  under  much 
restraint,  and  the  liberties  usually  allowed  to  a  grow- 
ing boy  were  well  curtailed.  He  slept  under  Mr. 
Berry's  counter  at  night,  dreaming  of  what  a  mean 
employer  he  had  and  how  unpromising  his  prospects 
seemed  to  be.  Berry  was  or  pretended  to  be  religious, 
and  went  early  to  Church  on  Sunday,  looking  sancti- 
monious and  good,  while  in  the  week  days  under  the 
cloak  of  piety,  he  would  wonder  how  he  could  squeeze 
his  neighbors  just  a  little  harder  or  get  a  little  more 
work  out  of  Billy,  his  clerk-bookkeeper-janitor-watch- 
dog combination.  From  Berry's,  Father  went  to  work 
for  Hyland  K.  Clark  and  took  his  meals  at  Mr. 
Clark's  house,  but  slept  at  the  store  as  usual.  Just 
how  and  when  he  worked  in  any  schooling  during  his 
life  in  Groton  in  1855  and  1856,  is  hard  to  imagine, 
but  he  did  get  some  by  getting  out  of  store  duty  dur- 
ing the  hours  when  business  was  slack. 

Mr.  Clark  took  more  of  an  interest  in  Father's 
welfare  because  he  was  a  better  constructed  man  than 
was  Styles,  and  also  because  his  sister  married  Pro- 
fessor Williams  who  was  Father's  half  brother.  The 


AS  A  YOUTH  IN  GROTON  AND  McLEAN      29 

echoes  of  Father's  life  in  Groton  village  still  sounding, 
indicate  that  he  was  a  happy  young  man  and  took 
things  philosophically  as  they  came  along,  enjoying 
life  as  best  he  could,  but  ever  restless  and  ambitious 
to  better  his  condition  in  a  material  way.  Grotonites 
speak  of  him  as  nice  looking.  He  was  jolly,  full  of 
fun,  a  good  scholar,  very  cheerful,  apt  at  learning, 
and  was  the  most  popular  young  man  in  the  village 
with  the  girls,  and  therefore  a  society  leader.  He 
loved  to  coast  down  the  Groton  hills  in  winter  time, 
and  was  captain  and  pilot  of  a  big  bob  sled  called 
"Brimstone"  which  would  carry  twelve  boys  at  one 
time  at  a  terrific  rate  of  speed.  They  had  a  dancing 
school  which  met  every  week  in  the  village  hotel, 
which  was  then  called  the  Groton  House,  but  which  is 
now  the  Hotel  Goodyear.  The  dances  were  held  in 
the  parlor  of  this  hotel  and  for  the  small  price  which 
it  cost  every  boy  to  belong,  he  was  privileged  and 
expected  to  bring  his  "steady,"  as  one's  sweetheart 
was  then  styled,  and  he  was  also  privileged  to  bring 
as  many  more  girls  as  he  chose,  not  exceeding  eight 
in  number,  and  these  extra  girls  were  called  "fillers." 
It  is  remembered  that  Father,  as  being  the  most 
popular  young  man  in  the  village  and  perhaps  the 
most  patriotic,  was  wont  to  exercise  his  fullest  privi- 
leges in  this  way,  much  to  the  joy  and  appreciation 
of  the  wallflower  "fillers"  in  a  village  which  seemed 
to  teem  with  many  more  girls  than  boys.  His  par- 
ticular fancy  or  steady,  lived  in  a  house  which  still 
exists  in  Groton  and  which  I  forbore  to  take  a  photo- 


30  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

graph  of  or  to  reminisce  further  about,  because  the 
lady  still  lives  and  would  likely  prefer  to  let  the  matter 
rest  in  the  obscure  past.  She  was  "Esteline"  to  him, 
which  name  is  long  enough  for  this  book,  and  for  the 
lady  too,  who  might  object  to  seeing  the  rest  of  it  in 
print,  besides  she  has  changed  the  rest  of  it  since  then. 

It  was  in  Groton  that  Father  organized  and  became 
the  leading  spirit  in  a  debating  club,  which  was  made 
up  of  young  men  of  the  village.  They  debated  upon 
popular  questions  and  particularly  upon  topics  which 
were  being  discussed  as  national  issues,  such  as 
slavery,  which  were  leading  up  to  the  great  Civil 
War  drama,  which  was  soon  to  be  enacted.  It  was 
then  that  he  grew  enthusiastic  as  the  expounder  of  his 
hero,  Napoleon,  for  which  purpose  he  would  have 
large  maps  hanging  on  the  wall  and  would  direct  the 
attention  of  his  listeners  to  them  in  a  most  interesting 
way,  spellbinding  them  into  following  him  through  all 
of  Napoleon's  great  campaigns,  showing  how  the 
armies  of  both  sides  were  lined  up  against  each  other 
and  how  they  manoeuvred  their  forces  to  victory  or 
defeat.  Father  early  had  the  gift  of  language  and  of 
clearly  and  concisely  expressing  his  thoughts,  which 
fact  all  his  early  contemporaries  seem  to  remember 
as  one  of  his  most  conspicuous  endowments. 

In  the  village  store  were  two  other  young  clerks, 
who  probably  served  mostly  during  the  hours  when 
Father  was  at  school.  A  rivalry  between  the  three 
sprang  up  in  the  matter  of  penmanship  and  each 
strove  to  outdo  the  other  in  the  excellence  of  his  skill 


AS  A  YOUTH  IN  GROTON  AND  McLEAN      31 

in  that  direction.  It  is  told  of  them  that  they  consumed 
large  stores  of  stationery  in  practicing  this  art  and 
that  when  their  employer  was  seen  coming  down  the 
street,  they  would  hastily  stuff  the  stove  full  of  the 
paper  upon  which  they  had  been  writing  and  set  fire 
to  it  in  order  to  destroy  the  evidence,  not  only  of  the 
paper  used,  but  of  the  valuable  time  which  they  had 
diverted  from  their  employer's  service.  Father's 
friends  both  early  and  recent,  will  remember  the  excel- 
lence of  his  penmanship  throughout  his  whole  life  and 
they  will  be  pleased  to  know  how  he  attained  perfec- 
tion in  the  art  in  the  manner  above  related. 

It  appears  in  Groton  also,  that  Father  was  not 
religious,  although  reverential  in  the  highest  degree. 
The  cloak  of  religion  which  his  former  employer  wore 
as  a  covering,  added  to  the  recollection  of  the  ten 
verses  from  the  Bible  that  he  had  to  learn  every  Sun- 
day, as  well  as  going  to  "meeting"  and  Sunday  School 
on  every  occasion; — these  things  probably  all  com- 
bined to  draw  him  away  from  religious  ideas  as  they 
were  then  taught.  He  had,  however,  all  the  compen- 
sating graces  that  a  young  man  could  have.  He  was 
never  known  to  do  a  mean  thing  nor  to  tell  a  lie  nor 
steal,  even  in  such  forgivable  ways  as  invading  a 
neighbor's  melon  patch.  He  could  be  depended  upon 
as  the  everlasting  friend  of  any  one  who  had  claims 
upon  his  friendship.  One  lovely  lady  in  Groton  told 
me  that  if  she  ever  got  into  any  straits  in  her  girl- 
hood, she  always  depended  upon  Will  Baker  to  help 
her  out  of  them  and  Will  Baker's  fertility  of  resource 


32  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

and  his  ever  ready  wit  always  succeeded  in  saving  her, 
or  any  one  else  he  had  under  his  protection,  from  the 
wrath  of  irate  schoolmasters,  parents  or  neighbors. 
I  was  unable  to  learn  that  Father  ever  did  anything 
that  he  was  ashamed  of  afterwards,  although  they  say 
he  cut  plenty  of  capers  of  a  nature  not  very  serious; 
that  he  was  a  practical  joker  and  very  fond  of  dis- 
playing his  skill  in  this  direction  on  anybody  and 
everybody,  and  that  he  liked  to  win  a  girl  away  from 
another  fellow,  not  because  he  wanted  the  girl,  but  to 
show  the  other  fellow  that  he  could  do  it. 

There  lived  in  the  village  of  Groton  at  this  time, 
Robert  C.  Reynolds,  who  was  the  partner  of  Hyland 
Clark  and  therefore  was  Father's  employer.  He  was 
the  patron  saint  of  the  village  among  the  boys.  He 
was  the  one  who  financed  their  picnics,  their  base 
ball  contests  and  many  of  their  good  times  generally. 
It  was  about  this  time  that  the  ice  cream  age  began.- 
Early  in  that  important  epoch,  when  this  dainty  article 
was  first  discovered  or  invented,  there  was  a  display 
of  it  at  the  County  Fair,  to  which  Father  and  the 
other  boys  and  girls  of  course  went.  It  was  pink  and 
it  was  white,  and  it  was  5  cents  for  a  whole  glass 
and  3  cents  for  half  a  glass.  It  is  said  that  Mr. 
Reynolds  who  beheld  Billy  Baker  as  he  gazed  upon  ice 
cream  for  the  first  time  in  his  life,  with  mouth  awater 
and  eyes  agleam,  perceived  a  strong  affinity  existing 
between  the  ice  cream  and  Billy  and  accordingly  slipped 
into  his  hand,  three  copper  pennies.  So  Billy  had  his 
first  ice  cream,  and  never  again  did  anything  taste 


AS  A  YOUTH  IN  GROTON  AND  McLEAN      33 

so  good  to  him.  He  took  pink,  topped  with  a  dash 
of  white.  And  again,  it  was  Mr.  Reynolds,  who  when 
the  village  school  house  came  near  being  sold  for 
debt,  bought  it  in  and  saved  it  for  the  village  until 
such  a  time  as  it  could  be  redeemed.  The  boys  all 
loved  him  and  Father  did  as  well  as  the  rest,  and 
there  is  no  doubt  but  what  this  good  man's  interest 
in  him  tended  much  to  mould  his  early  career. 

Finally  in  the  course  of  events,  and  in  less  than 
two  years,  Father  outgrew  Groton  as  he  had  out- 
grown Winfield,  and  the  time  came  for  him  to  move 
on  to  greater  opportunities.  His  instinct  drew  him 
another  pace  to  the  West,  this  time  to  the  village  of 
McLean  six  miles  away.  Preliminary  to  his  depart- 
ure, there  were  scenes,  some  open  and  some  undis- 
closed, where  disappointment  and  grief  reigned 
among  those  whom  he  was  to  leave  behind.  The 
schoolboys  and  girls  grieved  at  his  going  away, 
especially  as  he  was  going  alone  and  so  far, — six 
miles.  There  were  little  farewells  for  his  benefit; 
some  formal  and  some  informal:  In  the  village  school, 
little  speeches  were  made  by  the  boys  and  girls  and 
it  was  hard  to  restrain  a  sob  or  two.  His  brother 
Ralph  in  order  to  stifle  his  feelings  upon  one  of  these 
occasions,  had  stuffed  his  mouth  full  of  dry  bread, 
but  when  the  pressure  of  grief  became  greater  than 
the  tension  of  his  lips  and  cheeks,  the  bread  could 
no  longer  be  restrained  and  so  flew  in  a  shower  of 
crumbs  all  over  the  floor,  which  incident  prompted 
Father  to  say  that  he  hoped  "he  would  make  in  his 


34  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

future  career,  as  many  dollars  as  Ralph  had  expelled 
grains  of  bread  from  his  mouth."  At  this  point  it  is 
well  to  mention  that  the  commercial  instinct  satur- 
ated Father  through  and  through;  that  he  had  an 
ambition  to  make  money  and  that  he  was  a  natural 
born  trader  and  money  maker,  as  demonstrated  so 
well  in  his  later  business  career. 

Father  landed  in  McLean  village,  New  York,  from 
Groton  in  1856,  and  his  life  there  altogether  com- 
prised five  years.  He  worked  for  Daniel  B.  Marsh 
&  Co.,  and  took  his  meals  at  the  house  of  John  O. 
Marsh,  sleeping  in  the  store  as  usual,  his  employ- 
ment being  in  the  same  lines  that  engaged  him  in 
Winfield  and  Groton,  namely  clerk  in  the  village  store, 
including  the  postofrke  job  and  distributing  the  village 
mail,  but  it  is  said  he  never  read  the  post  cards  the 
way  country  postmistresses  usually  do.  He  was  too 
busy  and  too  honorable.  McLean  is  a  little  village 
of  about  150  now,  sleeping  among  the  hills  of  Central 
New  York,  figuratively  and  in  reality,  in  a  most  beau- 
tiful natural  environment.  It  probably  had  more 
people  in  it  then,  than  now,  for  the  coming  of  the 
railroad  there  in  later  years  did  not  help  it  at  all,  but 
rather  diverted  business  from  it  to  the  larger  towns. 
Although  he  went  to  a  smaller  place,  he  went  to 
larger  opportunities,  for  the  country  around  traded  in 
McLean  more  often  and  upon  a  larger  scale  than  in 
other  places,  and  "Marsh's  store"  was  the  principal 
emporium  of  that  part  of  the  State.  Father  kept 
books  there  and  sold  beans,  spruce  gum,  and  cheese- 


MlLLPOND    AND    SWIMMING     POOL    AT    McLEAN. 


RESIDENCE   OF    MR.    MARSH,    AT    McLEAx. 


AS  A  YOUTH  IN  GROTON  AND  McLEAN      35 

cloth,  bolts,  plows  and  pickles  the  same  as  in  the  other 
places,  and  was  an  expert  on  all  of  these  commodities. 
Here  he  outgrew  "Billy"  and  became  "Bill." 

His  power  as  a  debater  and  as  an  orator  in  embryo 
became  here  more  rounded  out  than  in  the  other 
places.  The  village  store  in  McLean  was  in  every 
sense  the  club  of  the  village.  Store  kept  open  until  nine 
or  ten  o'clock  at  night  and  the  villagers  always  rounded 
up  there  at  mail  time  and  for  the  purpose  of  discuss- 
ing slavery  and  war  topics  and  all  the  news  generally. 
They  would  sit  on  the  top  of  vinegar  kegs  and  sugar 
barrels  and  on  the  corners  of  the  counter  and  listen 
to  each  other's  views,  and  Bill  Baker,  as  master  of 
ceremonies,  made  the  place  lively  with  his  opinions 
and  theories,  positive  then  as  ever  afterwards,  and 
he  was  looked  upon  as  the  one  best  calculated  to 
mould  public  opinion  locally  and  to  reflect  the  mean- 
ing of  events  transpiring  in  the  country  at  large. 
He  had  a  debating  society  here  and  also  discoursed 
upon  Napoleon  as  he  had  done  before,  believing  in 
him  as  the  best  exponent  of  popular  liberty.  The 
debating  club  met  once  in  two  weeks  at  the  school 
house.  He  proclaimed  himself  in  this  village  as  a 
Republican  in  politics  in  1858,  which  was  his  first 
pronouncement  of  a  political  faith,  in  which  he  was 
ardent  and  active,  and  he  continued  through  his  life 
as  a  Republican  in  politics,  until  Grover  Cleveland 
appeared  as  a  candidate  for  President.  He  became 
very  popular  with  the  old  people  in  McLean.  He 
was  quick  witted,  quick  at  repartee,  and  was  the 


36          LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

brightest  there.  He  was  intensely  earnest  in  his  work 
and  in  everything  else  including  play.  For  his  ser- 
vices in  the  store  at  McLean  he  received  $50.00  per 
year,  but  he  also  got  his  board  and  washing,  although 
he  had  to  provide  his  clothes  independently.  In  the 
loft  of  the  store,  one  may  still  see  where  he  carved 
"Wm.  T.  Baker"  on  the  back  wall. 

In  the  country  about  McLean  are  maple  tree 
groves,  and  the  making  of  maple  sugar  was  one  of 
the  industries.  They  used  to  have  sugar  grove  pic- 
nics and  there  were  no  picnics  in  those  days  in  that 
part  of  the  world  that  Bill  Baker  did  not  go  to.  They 
used  to  tap  the  sugar  trees  and  lap  the  raw  sap  as  it 
came  percolating  through  the  bark,  for  it  was  very 
inviting  to  the  taste.  One's  capacity  for  this  kind  of 
diet  comes  to  a  sudden  limit,  and  I  remember  Father 
telling  stories  of  the  sugar  camps  and  how  he  and  the 
other  boys  and  girls  used  to  eat  sugar  sap  until  they 
got  sick,  and  then  they  would  eat  cucumber  pickles, 
which  acted  as  an  antidote  and  thus  put  them  in  shape 
to  go  at  the  sugar  sap  again,  which  operation  would 
be  repeated  until  the  sap  gave  out  or  the  pickles  did, 
or  until  night  came,  or  some  other  cause  prevented  a 
continuance  of  the  operation.  Father  had  time  to  play 
as  well  as  work,  and  he  was  as  earnest  in  his  play  as 
he  was  in  his  work.  He  was  especially  fond  of  base- 
ball, for  the  reason  that  being  light  of  foot  he  was  a 
splendid  runner  in  making  the  bases  and  securing 
home  runs.  Being  a  sprinter  stood  him  in  good  stead 
in  this  game.  He  always  liked  the  game  even  in  later 


AS  A  YOUTH  IN  GROTON  AND  McLEAN      37 

life,  and  used  to  attend  many  of  them  with  me  when 
I  was  a  boyi 

In  my  rural  pilgrimage  following  Father's  trail 
from  one  village  to  another,  and  in  the  villages,  I  cov- 
ered McLean  as  well, — I  rambled  about  wherever  I 
thought  he  rambled.  I  went  to  the  Marsh  home  where 
he  boarded  and  to  the  store  where  he  clerked,  stood 
behind  the  same  counter  that  he  did,  and  for  five 
minutes  was  as  ready  as  he  was  to  sell  goods,  but  it 
was  a  dull  day  and  no  customers  came.  I  strolled  up 
the  road  by  the  creek  to  ask  a  man  ninety  years  old  who 
had  always  lived  there,  what  he  knew  about  a  boy  named 
Bill  Baker  who  used  to  live  there,  but  he  didn't  know 
anything  on  the  subject,  for  the  poor  old  man  lived 
only  in  the  present,  with  the  end  of  it  all  just  down 
the  way  in  the  future.  So  then  I  took  a  snapshot  of 
the  pond  by  the  grist  mill,  made  by  a  dam  in  the 
creek  where  the  boys  used  to  swim  and  where  they 
still  do. 

In  McLean,  Father  took  sick  and  nearly  died  with 
typhoid  fever.  There  seemed  little  likelihood  of  his 
living  to  get  well  again,  but  he  did  after  a  long  and 
lingering  siege  of  it,  and  it  was  due  largely  to  the 
tender  nursing  of  a  young  woman  to  whom  he  was 
devoted  and  who  was  in  turn  to  him,  that  he  finally 
got  well.  This  illness  left  him  partially  deaf  and 
he  ever  afterwards  so  remained.  It  is  not  necessary 
to  mention  the  name  of  the  young  woman  that  I  have 
just  referred  to  or  to  describe  her  except  to  say  that 
she  was  an  attractive  "schoolmarm"  and  that  she  is 


38  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

still  living  in  another  part  of  the  same  State,  having 
married  another  and  raised  a  family  of  her  own.  To 
her  I  am  grateful  for  a  picture  of  my  father  as  he 
appeared  at  the  age  of  nineteen.  This  affair  is  said 
to  have  been  of  considerable  time  standing  and  very 
serious  with  both  parties,  but  there  finally  came  a  mis- 
understanding, after  which  they  ceased  to  "keep  com- 
pany," so  that  I  looked  elsewhere  for  a  mother  and 
in  time  really  did  get  a  "schoolmarm"  for  one.  It 
is  possible  that  this  love  affair  had  something  to  do 
with  Father's  finally  leaving  McLean  for  good,  for 
undoubtedly  he  would  be  as  intensely  serious  in  love 
as  he  would  be  in  business. 

How  could  he  have  lived  in  this  little  place  for  five 
years,  through  the  long  cold  snowbound  winters  and 
the  hot  summers?  I  wondered  at  it  when  I  looked 
about  the  store.  He  doubtless  wondered  at  it  too 
whenever  he  lifted  his  head  high  enough  to  see  how 
the  world  was  moving  on,  how  great  the  country  was 
becoming,  and  how  big  cities  and  towns  were  spring- 
ing up  throughout  the  great  unbounded  West.  He 
was  getting  to  be  a  man  and  he  was  all  aglow  writh 
an  ambition  to  strike  out  for  new  fields.  He  grew 
into  the  powers  of  young  manhood  and  with  it  came 
a  spirit  of  great  unrest.  The  world  seemed  to  beckon  to 
him  to  come  on  and  match  himself  against  all  men.  He 
saw  that  he  was  already  all  he  could  expect  to  be  if  he 
remained — he  felt  that  boundless  opportunity  stood 
before  him  if  he  went.  He  had  the  courage,  the 
strength,  the  ability  and  the  indomitable  spirit  neces- 


AS  A  YOUTH  IN  GROTON  AND  McLEAN      39 

sary  for  success.  He  had  a  good  name  and  no  money. 
He  was  fired  with  an  ambition  often  expressed  to 
make  his  mark  in  the  world.  He  was  filled  with  the 
highest  hopes  and  he  had  fears  of  nothing.  His  whole 
nature  was  afire  with  the  spirit  of  adventure,  conquest 
and  independence.  Thus  appointed,  was  he  the  one  to 
stay  in  McLean  ?  Not  he, — not  in  a  thousand  years ! 
Leave  there  he  would,  and  make  his  fortune  in  the 
far  West,  and  the  time  to  do  it  was  now,  and  not 
tomorrow. 

He  talked  much  with  the  boys  in  the  village,  trying 
to  get  some  of  them  to  go  out  West  with  him  and  seek 
their  fortunes  with  him,  showing  them  how  the  oppor- 
tunities in  the  village  were  few  and  limited  and  that 
it  was  not  a  place  to  tie  to  if  one  wanted  to  expand 
and  grow  with  the  progress  of  things  in  the  world  at 
large.  There  seems  to  have  been  no  one  with  nerve 
or  bravery  enough  to  wish  to  follow  him  out  into  the 
world,  but  he  went  nevertheless — alone,  while  the 
others  stayed  and  watched  his  star  rise  in  the  West 
as  he  came  to  the  threshhold  of  the  great  destiny 
which  the  future  had  in  store  for  him,  while  theirs 
stood  still  over  McLean. 

About  this  time  the  gold  discoveries  in  the  Rocky 
Mountains  caused  a  frenzy  of  excitement  throughout 
the  land.  It  stampeded  Father  just  at  the  time  he 
wanted  to  be  stampeded.  He  saw  the  roadway  of  his 
future  paved  with  gold  and  glory.  Westward  the 
course  of  Empire  was  going  and  in  that  procession 
he  felt  he  belonged.  He  rose  to  the  occasion  in  the 


40  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

full  stature  of  his  life  and  met  the  crisis  before  him. 
He  shook  off  the  mantle  of  McLean,  borrowed  forty 
dollars  from  his  employer  and  struck  out  for  the  great 
wide  West.  The  boy  of  Winfield,  Groton  and  Mc- 
Lean had  ceased  to  be;  it  was  a  man  and  every  inch 
a  man,  that  then  stepped  foot  into  the  young  town  of 
Chicago  in  1861,  stranded,  en  route  to  the  gold  fields 
of  the  Rocky  Mountains. 


1860— AGED  19. 


1868 — AGED   27. 


1878— AGED  37.  1893— AGED   ;V>. 

WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER. 


CHAPTER  III 

CAREER   IN   CHICAGO 
1861-1903 

T~¥  TILLIAM  T.  BAKER,  bookkeeper,  Hinck- 
Vy    ley  &  Handy,  24  Washington." 

The  above  is  what  one  will  read  in  the 
city  directory  of  Chicago  for  the  year  1862,  and  that 
tells  the  story  of  his  beginning  there  and  for  a  while 
at  least.  When  he  landed  at  the  depot  in  Chicago  it  was 
night  and  he  had  with  him  his  full  stock  in  trade,  viz., 
his  grip,  $4.00  and  himself,  together  with  the  inspira- 
tion he  had  read  of  George  Washington  having  for  his 
guide,  "I  hope  I  shall  always  possess  firmness  enough 
to  maintain  what  I  consider  the  most  enviable  of  all 
titles,  the  character  of  an  'Honest  Man.' '  He  was  a 
stranger  and  was  tired  out  and  had  never  been  in 
so  big  a  place  before,  so  he  felt  justified  in  hiring  a 
hack  to  go  to  a  hotel  which  some  one  on  the  train 
had  recommended  to  him  as  being  reasonable  and 
decent.  The  hackman  "knew  where  it  was  all  right" 
and  drove  him  a  long  way  around  several  squares  in 
the  city  and  finally  put  him  down  at  the  place  to  which 
he  had  been  directed  to  go.  Father  then  had  $1.50 
less  in  money,  but  he  went  to  bed  that  night  and 
dreamed  of  the  future  and  all  that  he  hoped  it  had  in 
store  for  him,  and  when  he  awoke  he  looked  out  the 


42  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

window  upon  the  city.  In  front  of  him  and  only 
across  the  street  stood  the  depot  where  he  had  gotten 
off  the  train  the  night  before,  and  then  he  felt  as  green 
as  he  had  doubtless  appeared  to  the  hackman.  And 
this  was  his  beginning  in  Chicago  in  the  year  1861. 
Chicago  at  that  time  was  a  husky  young  town  of 
120,000  people  and  had  had  for  ten  years  the  most 
rapid  growth  of  any  previous  period  in  its  history, 
or  in  fact,  of  any  subsequent  period.  Only  ten  years 
before,  in  1851,  it  had  not  more  than  30,000  people, 
and  everybody  is  familiar  with  the  well  known  picture 
of  Chicago  in  1833  when  it  was  merely  a  trading  post 
where  the  Indians  came  to  barter  their  skins  and  other 
merchandise  to  the  white  people.  The  town  was  then 
composed  of  a  small  stockade  called  Ft.  Dearborn,  a 
store  and  a  dwelling;  and  the  Chicago  River  was 
merely  a  winding  creek  or  rivulet  which  could  hardly 
accommodate  a  craft  any  larger  than  an  Indian  canoe. 
The  Minneways,  a  tribe  of  Indians,  inhabited  this  sec- 
tion of  the  land,  and  they  called  the  post  "Checagau," 
which  in  their  language  meant  "wild  onion."  Of 
course  the  town  growing  as  it  had  been  doing  since 
that  primitive  time  and  drawing  people  as  it  was  then 
doing  from  all  sections  of  the  country,  gave  it  a  wide 
advertisement,  and  resulted  in  its  being  talked  about 
and  discussed  just  as  is  now  the  case  of  Seattle. 
Chicago  then  of  course,  became  the  Mecca  of  am- 
bitious and  adventurous  spirits,  and  it  was  that  kind 
of  people  who  laid  the  foundation  for  the  metropolis 
which  the  future  was  to  bring  forth.  The  total  value 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  43 

of  Chicago,  as  Father  first  saw  it,  was  only  about 
$36,000,000  in  real  estate  and  personal  property 
according  to  the  then  assessed  valuation,  and  against 
this  it  had  a  debt  of  a  little  over  $2,000,000.  Think  of 
the  number  of  her  citizens  now  who  could  buy  and 
pay  for  the  whole  city  as  it  was  then,  and  still  have 
something  left.  Even  a  man  of  frugal  means  could 
have  bought  the  whole  city  a  few  years  before  the  time 
of  Father's  coming,  for  it  will  be  recalled  how  Mr. 
Kinzie  the  first  American  settler  there  bought  all  the 
north  half  of  Chicago  for  the  sum  of  $50.00,  having 
taken  the  trade  off  the  hands  of  another  man  who 
had  made  it,  and  who  felt  that  he  had  gotten  a  bad 
bargain,  and  so  worried  himself  sick  over  it  until 
Kinzie  came  along  and  did  him  this  good  turn,  after 
having  been  begged  and  beseeched  to  do  so. 

In  1858  the  business  district  of  Chicago  was  con- 
fined to  that  part  of  the  city  north  of  Madison  Street 
to  the  River,  and  from  Fifth  Avenue  to  Michigan  Ave- 
nue. The  rest  of  what  is  now  called  the  Loop  District 
was  mainly  a  residential  quarter,  where  lived  the  mer- 
chant princes  and  traders  of  the  time.  Van  Buren 
Street  on  the  South,  Halsted  on  the  West,  and 
Chicago  Avenue  on  the  North  were  the  extreme 
limits  of  the  City.  At  this  time,  local  transportation 
was  principally  by  omnibus.  Street  railways  were  just 
coining  into  operation  on  a  few  of  the  principal  streets, 
and  were  of  course  operated  by  animal  power. 

When  Father  came  to  Chicago,  most  of  the  streets 
were  dirt  roads,  which  later  they  began  to  surface 


44          LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

with  gravel,  and  some  of  the  streets  in  the  business 
part  were  planked  over,  but  modern  paving  was  not 
thought  of.  The  town  had  a  water  works,  and  build- 
ings commensurate  with  its  size,  but  most  of  the 
buildings  were  of  wood,  especially  in  the  residence  dis- 
trict. John  Wentworth  was  Mayor — 6  feet  6  inches 
tall,  and  that  is  why  they  called  him  "Long  John."  He 
might  have  been  called  Honest  John  or  Fighting  John, 
for  he  was  all  that  such  names  imply;  and  old  Chi- 
cagoans  look  back  upon  his  several  terms  of  service 
in  the  Mayor's  chair  as  perhaps  the  most  efficient  in 
the  city's  history. 

It  was  the  natural  place  for  a  city  to  grow,  and 
that  is  why  it  was  born  there;  for  nobody  would 
deliberately  choose  as  the  site  for  a  future  city  a  dis- 
mal swamp  as  Chicago  was  then.  It  was  however 
the  point  where  the  trade  with  the  vast  and  growing 
agricultural  districts  of  the  Middle  West  converged 
and  established  the  commerce  of  the  Great  Lakes. 
The  farmers  at  this  time  brought  their  wheat  to  town 
by  wagons  and  unloaded  it  by  hand  into  the  grain 
warehouses.  The  wheat  merchants  in  those  days  went 
out  into  the  rural  districts  and  met  the  farmers  and 
traded  with  them,  buying  their  wheat  after  actually 
seeing  it  grow  in  the  fields  or  stored  in  the  graneries 
on  the  farms.  That  was  the  wheat  business  then — 
quite  in  contrast  with  what  it  has  developed  into  since 
and  as  one  sees  it  today,  when  the  grain  kings  seldom 
see  their  grain  and  only  know  of  it  by  holding  un- 
certain options  upon  it. 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  45 

It  was  not  Chicago,  however,  that  my  father  started 
out  to  find.  His  ambition,  as  I  have  already  stated, 
was  to  dig  for  gold  in  the  Rocky  Mountains  rather 
than  to  find  it  in  the  channels  of  business.  His  touch- 
ing at  Chicago  was  an  incident  of  his  trip,  and  his 
staying  there  was  an  incident  of  the  financial  condition 
in  which  he  found  himself  and  which  made  it  impos- 
sible for  him  to  proceed  further.  So  he  started  out 
to  look  the  town  over  and  see  what  it  would  do  for  him 
in  the  way  of  his  getting  a  temporary  living  and  sav- 
ing enough  besides  to  permit  him  to  continue  on  his 
journey  at  a  later  time.  He  remembered  that  he  had 
in  his  pocket  a  letter  to  Julius  Chambers  from  Mrs. 
Marsh  of  McLean,  for  whose  husband  he  had  worked 
in  that  village,  and  in  whose  home  he  boarded  there. 
Mr.  Chambers  and  Mrs.  Marsh  were  related  in  some 
way.  He  did  not  expect  to  use  the  letter  except  per- 
haps to  afford  him  a  few  hours  acquaintance  and  rec- 
reation while  passing  through  the  town,  but  as  the 
letter  stated  that  "Billy  was  the  best  clerk  Mr.  Marsh 
ever  had  in  his  store,"  he  thought  he  would  use  it  and 
see  if  the  "best  clerk"  certificate  for  McLean  would 
have  any  value  or  meaning  for  a  place  as  big  as 
Chicago.  Undaunted,  therefore,  he  sought  out  Mr. 
Chambers  and  told  him  of  his  purpose  and  ambition. 
Mr.  Chambers  took  a  real  interest  in  him,  as  people 
generally  did  when  he  was  first  presented  to  them.  It 
was  through  Mr.  Chambers,  therefore,  that  he  was 
introduced  to  the  firm  of  Hinckley  &  Handy,  which 
firm  ran  a  commission  business  on  South  Water  ^Street 


46  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

near  the  river,  dealing  in  grain  and  general  prov- 
isions. The  firm  sized  up  the  candidate  for  a  job  very 
thoroughly  and  carefully,  and  they  particularly 
wanted  to  know  if  he  could  keep  books.  "O,  yes,  he 
could  keep  books  all  right;  he  had  done  that  in  the 
largest  and  only  store  in  McLean,"  and  although  the 
bookkeeping  there  had  consisted  only  of  adding  up 
the  sales  at  the  bottom  of  the  page  every  day,  and 
seeing  if  it  footed  with  the  cash  in  the  drawer,  yet  he 
did  not  go  into  details  as  to  that,  but  simply  asserted 
his  ability  as  a  master  of  the  art.  He  was  therefore 
engaged  on  trial  and  told  to  report  the  next  morning. 
He  went  out  feeling  very  happy  at  getting  to  work 
so  soon,  for  it  made  Pikes'  Peak  and  the  Rocky  Moun- 
tains loom  up  much  larger  and  nearer  than  they  had 
ever  done  before  in  his  contemplation  of  that  ambi- 
tion. 

But  he  realized  as  he  left  the  store  that  keeping 
books  in  McLean  was  one  thing  and  keeping  them  in 
Chicago  for  a  large  commission  house  was  another 
thing.  So  he  hunted  up  a  book  store  and  purchased 
a  text  book  on  the  subject  of  bookkeeping,  which  took 
nearly  all  the  money  he  had  left.  He  staid  up  all  night 
with  his  book  and  studied  it  from  beginning  to  end,  so 
that  when  he  took  his  position  for  duty  the  next  day  he 
felt  himself  pretty  well  equipped  to  cope  with  the  situ- 
ation. He  applied  himself  to  this  new  task  with  the 
same  earnestness  that  he  always  did  to  anything  which 
he  undertook,  so  that  he  not  only  was  able  to  do  the 
work,  but  he  soon  became  an  expert  bookkeeper  and 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  47 

accountant,  and  he  invented  forms  and  devices  for 
keeping  books  which  were  particularly  adapted  to  the 
grain  trade,  and  which  are  today  in  vogue  in  the  grain 
business  in  Chicago.  He  soon  gave  up  the  ambition 
to  go  further  West  as  he  became  better  acquainted 
with  the  people  and  more  contented  with  his  immedi- 
ate environment.  He  made  friends  rapidly  and  grew 
in  the  esteem  and  favor  of  his  employers,  and  he  soon 
began  to  feel  himself  a  part  of  the  bone  and  sinew 
of  the  throbbing  young  Chicago. 

Being  an  expert  bookkeeper,  however,  even  for  a 
Chicago  firm,  which  perhaps  at  one  time  might  have 
been  the  zenith  of  his  ambition,  would  not  do  for  one 
of  his  calibre  indefinitely.  The  firm  which  employed 
him  also  began  to  see  that  he  was  really  too  big  for 
his  job  and  that  his  sphere  of  usefulness  should  be 
expanded;  so  he  went  into  the  pit  on  the  board  of 
trade  and  became  the  trader  for  the  firm  while  his 
salary  was  increased  correspondingly.  Then  it  was 
not  very  long,  and  in  fact  not  over  a  year  after  his 
arrival,  before  the  firm  saw  that  they  were  going  to  lose 
him  if  they  did  not  take  him  in  and  make  him  one  of 
them  as  a  partner,  and  this  was  done,  although  his 
name  did  not  appear  at  the  time  in  the  firm  name, 
but  a  "Co."  was  added  to  it,  he  being  the  "Co.,"  and 
the  firm  thereafter  being  styled  Hinckley,  Handy  &  Co. 
This  business  arrangement  continued  for  only  a  year 
or  so,  when  both  Messrs.  Hinckley  and  Handy  con- 
cluded to  retire  from  business  and  so  withdrew  from 
the  firm  which  was  therefore  dissolved  about  the  year 


48          LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

1864.  My  father  then  continued  alone  under  the  style 
of  William  T.  Baker,  and  he  so  continued  to  do  until 
1868,  his  place  of  business  being  first  on  South  Water 
Street,  and  then  on  LaSalle  Street,  near  Washington. 
He  was  twenty-seven  years  old  at  this  time  and  is 
remembered  as  being  well  groomed,  fastidious  in  his 
attire  and  five  feet  eight  inches  tall  and  about  165 
pounds  in  weight.  In  order  to  inspire  confidence  and 
lend  to  his  appearance  that  dignity  which  perhaps  a 
youthful  countenance  failed  to  give  it,  he  began  about 
this  time  to  wear  bushy  sandy  side  whiskers  and  a 
moustache,  which  style  in  changing  degrees  he 
affected  for  the  balance  of  his  life.  He  favored  the 
blond  type  in  his  complexion  and  the  color  of  his 
hair  and  eyes. 

Being  a  chip  off  the  old  block — his  mother — he 
was  thrifty  and  saved  his  money  and  soon  begun  to 
have  little  investments  of  his  own,  both  in  the  firm 
and  out  of  it.  Then  in  a  little  while  he  felt  that  he 
was  getting  rich  enough  to  take  care  of  still  another 
besides  himself,  and  his  mother  and  sister  whom  he 
had  been  supporting. 

Now,  of  course,  a  young  man,  like  what  we  know 
him  to  have  been  at  that  time,  was  not  the  kind  to 
shut  himself  up  from  all  society  and  good  times;  in 
fact  if  there  was  anything  going  on  he  was  sure  to 
be  identified  in  some  way  or  other,  and  so  it  came  to 
pass  that  among  the  young  ladies  whom  he  knew  and 
liked  to  go  with,  he  finally  met  my  mother,  who  was 
a  school  teacher.  He  had  a  liking  for  "schoolmarms." 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  49 

This  affair  became  serious  after  about  a  year  and  re- 
sulted in  their  getting  married,  but  I  will  tell  about 
that  event  in  the  next  chapter  which  I  will  give  to 
a  brief  sketch  of  her.  They  went  first  to  the  Sherman 
House  and  afterwards  to  live  modestly  in  a  boarding 
house  at  24  Washington  Street,  but  like  most  young 
wives  she  wanted  a  home  of  their  own,  so  they  rented 
a  small  cottage  on  the  west  side,  which  in  after  times 
we  used  to  drive  by  and  which  Father  used  to  point 
to  as  the  first  home  he  had  in  Chicago  and  as  the 
place  where  I  was  born.  I  have  no  idea  just  where 
this  house  was  or  if  it  is  still  in  existence,  although  I 
do  remember  that  with  the  raising  of  the  grade  of 
the  streets  of  Chicago  it  was  left  about  ten  feet  below 
the  sidewalk.  Later  they  moved  into  22nd  Street  on 
the  corner  of  the  alley  between  Prairie  and  Indian 
Avenues,  being  the  end  house  in  a  row  of  four  small 
frame  houses  which  were  in  after  years  demolished  to 
give  place  to  the  residence  of  Mr.  Byron  L.  Smith. 

At  this  time  the  great  Civil  War  was  beginning  and 
every  one's  fortunes  were  affected  in  varying  degrees. 
Father  was  fired  with  the  patriotism  and  warlike 
spirit  which  characterized  most  of  the  young  Ameri- 
cans at  that  time.  He  was  bent  upon  shouldering  a 
musket  and  going  to  the  front  where  hostilities  were 
already  under  way  between  the  North  and  South.  But 
he  had  a  young  and  pleading  wife  who  clung  to  him 
and  tearfully  besought  him  to  remember  her  little  self 
who  did  not  want  to  be  a  widow,  so  that  he  stayed 
home  and  hired  a  man  for  $1,000  to  go  in  his  place  as 


50  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

a  substitute.  This  man  turned  out  to  be  a  "bounty 
jumper,"  as  it  developed  later  that  he  did  not  go  to 
the  war  as  agreed,  although  he  took  Father's  money. 
However,  there  was  a  threatened  outbreak  at  Camp 
Douglas,  near  Chicago,  where  many  Southern  pris- 
oners were  held  captive,  so  that  Father  volunteered 
and  was  sworn  in  for  picket  duty  in  connection  with 
that  encampment ;  and  it  is  told  of  him  that  in  the  chilly 
and  spectral  night  he  paraded  up  and  down  with  a 
rifle  on  his  shoulder  ready  to  shoot  down  any  bold 
Southern  rebel  who  might  dare  to  try  to  get  away. 
This  picket  duty  was  all  the  actual  active  warfare  in 
which  he  engaged  for  the  protection  of  the  republic, 
and  how  long  he  thus  served  I  do  not  know.  He  how- 
ever was  active  with  his  voice,  and  was  a  ready  and 
lively  participant  in  public  meetings  and  debates  where 
the  burning  questions  of  the  times  were  under  dis- 
cussion. 

Now  if  the  nation  lost  by  Father's  staying  home 
from  the  war,  it  probably  gained  in  another  way,  for 
babies  began  to  arrive  in  the  22nd  Street  home.  The 
stork  roosted  on  the  roof  of  that  house  with  more 
indulgence  to  those  inside  of  it,  than  he  did  to  any  of 
the  neighbors,  and  so  quite  a  little  colony  was  formed 
as  more  specifically  set  forth  in  the  following  chapter. 
It  became  a  little  kingdom  in  itself,  ruled  by  a  real 
king  and  presided  over  by  a  fond  and  indulgent  sun- 
shine queen,  with  lesser  subjects  varying  in  import- 
ance, size  and  temperament,  who  warred  with  each 
other  or  made  peace  according  to  the  conditions  exist- 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  51 

ing  from  time  to  time,  which  best  served  for  the  one 
or  the  other. 

In  this  house  the  children  were  all  born  except  the 
first  two  and  the  last  one.  It  was  in  this  house  that 
my  brother  and  I  received  our  first  real  and  undiluted 
paternal  discipline.  It  came  about  from  the  fact  that 
Father  had  indulged  the  family  in  the  luxury  of  a  new 
set  of  cane-seated  chairs  for  the  dining  room,  and  in- 
deed, to  us  at  that  time  such  a  set  of  chairs  was  a  luxury. 
Then  came  an  evil  genus  into  the  heads  of  my  brother 
and  myself,  which  prompted  us  to  rise  up  exceptionally 
early  one  morning  and  go  to  the  dining  room,  where 
with  hatchet  and  hammer  we  pounded  the  seats  out 
of  every  chair  in  the  room.  It  was  useless  to  attempt 
to  prove  an  alibi,  and  he  therefore  exercised  his  right 
of  "habeas  corpus/'  we  being  the  "corpuses,"  and  im- 
prisoned us  each  in  a  room  by  himself  with  the  light 
shut  off,  moored  to  the  bedpost  by  a  clothesline  for  the 
space  of  three  days,  after  first  having  been  whipped 
with  a  horse  whip.  This  is  my  candid  recollection  of 
that  incident,  but  Father  always  claimed  that  we  were 
only  spanked  and  shut  up  for  an  hour. 

Thus  it  was  that  Father's  children  made  interesting 
his  domestic  life,  which  may  have  added  more  zeal  to 
his  business  career, — at  least  I  shall  be  happy  to  think 
that  any  of  our  little  acts  of  thoughtlessness  may  have 
spurred  him  on  to  greater  efforts  in  his  business.  It 
was  in  this  house  or  rather  in  the  barn  in  the  rear  of 
it,  that  ten  cents  of  Father's  money  appropriated  for 
our  Sunday  school  exchequer  was  diverted  from  and 


52  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

never  yet  has  reached  the  said  exchequer,  but  was  con- 
verted instead  into  a  long  black  cigar  which  gave  my 
brother  and  me  and  another  boy  at  the  average  age 
of  ten,  our  first  (my  last)  smoke,  instead  of  being 
bored  by  going  to  Sunday  school.  That  smoking  party 
broke  up  before  it  was  over  or  the  fire  out,  and  resulted 
in  three  small  boys  dragging  themselves  home,  as  they 
thought,  to  die.  The  mother  who  stooped  to  kiss  the 
coming  angels,  smiled  in  her  grief  and  became  un- 
sympathetic, for  our  breaths  were  fragrant  with  the 
tell-tale  tobacco.  It  was  in  this  house  that  Father 
began  to  spank,  and  as  time  went  on  more  spankees 
came  in  for  spanks.  It  is  hardly  possible  that  real 
good  reasons  existed  for  such  ministrations,  so  maybe 
it  was  simply  a  passing  down  to  posterity  that  which 
undoubtedly  formed  in  his  youth — a  part  of  his  par- 
ental blessings.  Doubtless  the  advanced  guards  of  his 
posterity  felt  at  the  time  that  he  was  actuated  solely 
by  the  worthy  motive  of  getting  even  for  what  ances- 
tral discipline  had  showered  upon  him,  and  doubtless 
the  same  advanced  guards  then  finally  resolved  to 
abide  their  time  through  the  years  to  follow,  when 
they  too  might  hope  to  do  some  showering. 

As  the  family  grew  in  numbers  and  prosperity,  the 
end  house  of  the  wooden  row  was  outgrown,  and  so 
we  moved  to  797  Michigan  Avenue,  which  was  after- 
wards numbered  2238,  being  the  southernmost  one  of 
the  Orphan  Asylum's  brick  houses  between  22nd  and 
23rd  Streets.  We  took  up  our  abode  at  this  place  in 
1867,  the  new  environment  being  to  our  family  quite 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  53 

a  coming  up  in  the  world.  Father  took  this  house 
under  a  ten  year  lease  at  a  thousand  dollars  a  year. 
This  house  had  a  back  yard  to  it  with  a  high  board 
fence  in  the  rear,  which  served  as  a  barricade  between 
our  premises  and  the  playground  of  the  Orphan 
Asylum  children.  There  were  knot  holes  in  this  fence, 
which  we  boys  used  as  loop  holes  when  we  engaged  in 
warfare  with  the  orphans  on  the  other  side.  We 
would  shoot  pebbles  through  at  them  with  sling  shots 
and  often  seriously  damaged  them,  and  they  would 
throw  heavy  missiles  back,  which  often  went  over 
the  top  of  the  fence  and  through  the  rear  windows  of 
our  house,  which  would  result  in  peace  being  arranged 
between  our  parents  and  the  managers  of  the  Orphan 
Asylum,  by  the  terms  of  which  our  parents  usually 
had  to  pay  a  financial  forfeit  or  indemnity,  taking  the 
same  out  of  our  several  hides.  While  our  business 
was  thus  going  on  through  the  fence  and  over  it, 
Father  was  conducting  his  with  equal  energy, 
although  in  a  more  peaceful  way  down  town.  Father 
was  well  on  the  way  to  fortune  and  we  children  were 
in  the  halcyon  days  of  our  childhood  joys,  when  on 
September  I7th,  1873  a  great  sorrow  came  to  our 
household,  for  our  young  mother  was  killed  in  a  run- 
away. I  will  tell  more  of  this  in  the  chapter  I  will 
write  about  her.  The  sunshine  which  was  thus 
clouded  from  my  father's  life  probably  caused  him 
to  plunge  more  deeply  into  business  and  lend  austerity 
and  sternness  to  his  character.  It  in  a  way  drew  him 
from  his  children,  whose  proper  bringing  up  he  then 


64          LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

delegated  to  our  mother's  sister,  Mrs.  Mary  Smith, 
a  widow,  who  then  came  and  presided  over  the  home. 
Among  his  business  acquaintances  at  this  time  were 
two  other  young  men — Mr.  Walter  F.  Cobb  and 
Charles  A.  Knight,  who  in  a  partnership  relation  be- 
tween themselves  had  been  operating  a  business  simi- 
lar to  Father's,  with  more  or  less  success.  The  clients 
of  Messrs.  Knight  and  Cobb  and  those  of  my  father 
and  several  other  commission  houses  had  bought  a 
very  considerable  amount  of  corn  about  this  time,  both 
seller  September  and  buyer  October,  and  foolishly 
enough  as  it  afterwards  proved,  these  several  interests 
combined  together  to  force  grain  to  a  higher  price  level. 
The  result  of  this  attempted  corner  proved  very  dis- 
astrous to  the  trade  generally,  as  it  also  did  to  all  the 
parties  interested,  as  it  caused  the  failure  of  six  or 
seven  Board  of  Trade  houses.  When  the  horizon 
cleared  after  this  occurrence,  my  father  found  that 
he  must  seek  for  a  new  line  of  customers  and  more 
capital,  as  he  was  left  with  only  moderate  means ;  and 
Mr.  Cobb  and  Mr.  Knight  found  themselves  in  the 
same  situation.  As  a  result  of  this  misfortune  the 
three  young  men  were  brought  closer  together,  with 
the  result  that  after  several  conferences  they  estab- 
lished a  new  firm  under  the  style  of  Knight,  Baker 
&  Co.,  in  which  firm  Mr.  Cobb  also  joined.  This  firm 
began  business  in  1869  with  offices  opposite  the  Board 
of  Trade  in  La  Salle  Street.  Under  the  partnership 
arrangement  it  became  the  duty  of  Mr.  Knight  and 
my  father  to  take  turns  in  travelling  to  look  up  cus- 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  55 

tomers  and  attending  to  the  business  on  the  Board  of 
Trade,  while  Mr.  Cobb  had  charge  of  the  finances  and 
general  business  of  the  office.  Theirs  was  essentially 
a  grain  shipping  business,  it  being  their  purpose  to 
develop  it  principally  along  that  line  and  to  the  great- 
est extent  possible,  in  the  ambition  of  making  their 
firm  the  strongest  and  most  important  one  in  the  busi- 
ness. The  business,  however,  consisted  mostly  in  ship- 
ping grain  to  the  New  England  States  by  the  different 
railway  systems — called  through  lines — and  they  also 
did  a  moderate  business  via  the  Lakes  and  the  Erie 
Canal,  which  required  very  close  watching  as  very 
keen  competition  had  to  be  met.  The  combined 
energies  of  the  three  partners  developed  the  business 
rapidly  and  the  firm  soon  became  one  of  the  most 
prosperous. 

Then  when  the  future  was  beginning  to  look  the 
brightest,  the  great  Chicago  fire  came  along,  begin- 
ning October  8,  1871,  and  for  two  days  devastated 
the  most  valuable  portion  of  the  city,  destroying  al- 
most entirely  the  business  section,  and  driving  thou- 
sands of  people  from  their  homes.  History  had  re- 
corded no  greater  conflagration  than  this.  In  the 
short  time  that  the  flames  were  at  work,  3^/2  square 
miles  in  area  were  devastated  and  $187,000,000  of 
property  went  up  in  smoke,  and  over  300  people  lost 
their  lives.  That  which  had  been  a  magnificent,  sub- 
stantial and  prosperous  city  of  forty-seven  years' 
building,  was  reduced  in  a  few  hours  to  a  heap  of 
smouldering  ruins.  Nothing  was  left  but  ashes  and 


56          LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

debris  to  show  where  the  young  metropolis  only  two 
days  before  had  stood.  This  catastrophe  of  course, 
destroyed  the  business  of  my  father's  firm,  although 
it  caused  them  comparatively  little  property  loss  for 
the  reason  that  their  holdings  of  grain  had  been 
largely  stored  in  elevators  which  had  not  been  reached 
by  the  fire,  and  they  were  fortunate  as  well  in  collect- 
ing a  good  percentage  of  insurance  on  grain  destroyed. 
Nothing  daunted,  however,  they  took  heart  again  in 
common  with  the  prevailing  spirit  of  the  stricken  citi- 
zens, and  in  a  few  days  they  opened  up  a  temporary 
office  in  the  basement  of  our  house  at  797  Michigan 
Avenue,  about  two  miles  from  the  former  business 
centre. 

There  was  no  business  centre  immediately  follow- 
ing the  fire  and  the  people  conducted  their  business  in 
their  homes, — if  they  had  not  been  destroyed  by  the 
fire,  or  in  tents  or  board  sheds  constructed  for  the  pur- 
pose in  private  yards  or  vacant  lots  scattered  about 
the  city.  The  temporary  office  at  home  was  soon 
abandoned  and  a  new  location  secured  in  a  loft  on 
Canal  Street  on  the  west  bank  of  the  river,  near  where 
the  Board  of  Trade  was  temporarily  holding  its  busi- 
ness sessions.  Soon  afterwards  the  Board  of  Trade 
constructed  a  temporary  edifice  which  was  known  as 
the  "Wigwam,"  and  which  occupied  Washington 
Street  from  Market  Street  to  the  river.  The  office 
next  in  order  occupied  by  the  firm  was  a  space  about 
15  x  30  feet  in  this  wigwam.  This  location  also  was 
temporary,  and  later,  after  the  city  had  begun  to  re- 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  57 

build,  they  moved  down  Washington  Street  to  a  loca- 
tion between  La  Salle  and  Wells  Streets.  Although 
they  again  begun  to  do  fairly  well,  as  their  business 
was  strictly  brokerage  and  commission,  the  same 
could  not  be  said  of  their  clients,  and  this  fact  resulted 
in  Mr.  Knight  becoming  very  discouraged  at  the  busi- 
ness outlook,  so  that  he  withdrew  from  the  firm  in 
1872,  taking  with  him  the  bulk  of  the  capital.  Mr. 
Cobb  and  my  father  thereupon  with  a  capital  of  not 
over  $10,000  between  the  two  of  them,  branched  out 
once  more  under  the  firm  name  of  Wm.  T.  Baker  & 
Co.,  and  took  a  fine  large  suite  of  offices  at  84  and  86 
La  Salle  Street. 

At  this  location  they  displayed  a  good  front,  spend- 
ing a  large  sum  of  money  in  elaborate  office  furniture 
and  fittings,  together  with  an  arrangement  of  private 
offices,  with  the  idea  that  this  display  would  give  the 
impression  of  prosperity.  In  undoubtedly  did  give 
that  impression  and  helped  them  to  build  up  a  valuable 
line  of  customers.  With  much  zeal,  nerve  and  indus- 
try, Father  then  started  out  to  get  a  share  of  the  busi- 
ness of  some  of  the  largest  houses  in  New  York,  Phila- 
delphia and  Boston,  and  he  succeeded  in  this  purpose 
with  the  result  that  the  business  from  that  time  grew 
very  rapidly.  Jesse  Hoyt  &  Co.  and  David  Dows 
&  Co.  of  New  York  handled  their  business  for  them 
at  the  eastern  end.  In  1877  Mr.  Cobb,  in  behalf 
of  the  firm,  went  abroad  and  established  connections 
in  Europe,  with  the  result  that  in  a  very  short  time 
the  firm  became  large  exporters  of  grain  on  through 


58  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

bills  of  lading,  the  grain  being  transferred  at  the  sea- 
board from  cars  to  ocean  going  vessels.  Dewar  and 
Webb  of  London,  an  extensive  grain  house  of  that 
city,  were  their  chief  correspondents  abroad.  The 
firm  of  Wm.  T.  Baker  &  Co.  now  came  into  the  zenith 
of  its  career  and  developed  into  one  of  the  largest 
grain  shipping  houses  in  the  world. 

Each  success  stimulated  Father  to  greater  ambi- 
tions and  the  broadening  of  the  scope  of  his  com- 
mercial activities,  setting  higher  each  time  the  goal 
to  which  they  aspired.  He  began  to  think  that  the 
firm  should  have  a  navy  of  its  own  to  ply  upon  the 
Great  Lakes  and  engage  in  the  carrying  trade,  not  only 
for  their  own  shipments,  but  for  independent  ship- 
ments as  well.  This  idea  resulted  in  the  building  of  the 
schooner  Rutherford  B.  Hayes  in  1878.  At  that  time 
she  was  the  largest  carrier  upon  the  Great  Lakes,  her 
capacity  being  50,000  bushels  of  corn.  While  they 
were  casting  about  for  a  name  for  the  schooner  which 
was  then  on  the  ways,  my  father  happened  to  be  in 
attendance  at  the  Republican  National  Convention, 
which  was  then  being  held  in  Chicago,  and  on  that 
day  Rutherford  B.  Hayes  was  nominated  for  the 
Presidency  of  the  United  States.  When  he  returned 
to  the  office  he  said,  "I  have  a  name  for  the  schooner. 
We  will  name  her  after  the  luckiest  man  in  the  coun- 
try." She  was  accordingly  so  named,  and  Father  took 
one  of  my  brothers  and  myself  to  the  christening  when 
she  was  launched  near  Detroit.  This  schooner  not 
only  served  the  purpose  of  carrier  for  the  convenience 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  59 

of  the  firm  and  its  clients,  but  served  the  profitable 
purpose  at  times  of  a  regulator  of  freight  rates  out 
of  Chicago,  for  Father  undoubtedly  had  this. feature 
in  mind  when  he  conceived  the  idea  of  building  the 
ship.  When  it  happened  that  the  firm  had  no  cargo 
of  their  own  for  the  Hayes,  she  was  immediately  let 
out  to  other  shippers  and  the  rates  she  made  for  the 
service  did  much  towards  establishing  reasonable 
charges  by  other  vessel  owners.  Often  too,  they  used 
the  Hayes  in  this  way  to  lower  rates,  of  which  they 
availed  themselves  by  chartering  other  vessels  for 
their  own  business.  The  schooner  Hayes  was  a  re- 
markable vessel  in  that  she  had  a  larger  capacity  than 
any  vessel  of  her  dimensions,  and  she  was  endowed 
with  unusual  seaworthiness,  however,  she  now  lies 
at  the  bottom  of  the  lakes,  having  foundered  as  the 
result  of  a  collision  several  years  after  the  firm  ceased 
to  own  her. 

As  a  companion  to  the  Hayes,  Baker  &  Co.  pur- 
chased the  powerful  steamer  Antelope  with  the  idea 
of  having  her  tow  the  Hayes  in  tandem  with  other 
vessels  for  the  purpose  of  making  better  time  between 
Chicago  and  Buffalo  than  could  be  insured  from  sail- 
ing independently  and  depending  upon  the  winds 
alone.  The  Antelope  carried  considerable  cargo,  as 
well  as  serving  in  the  towing  capacity,  but  this  experi- 
ment did  not  prove  successful  so  that  the  steamer  was 
sold  some  time  after. 

The  business  of  the  firm  grew  and  continued  more 
and  more  prosperous.  At  one  time  they  had  borrowed 


60          LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

in  connection  with  this  business  half  of  the  deposits 
of  the  First  National  Bank  of  Chicago.  In  other 
words  their  loans  amounted  to  about  $3,000,000  at 
3  per  cent.  The  bank  then  was,  of  course,  much  smaller 
than  at  the  present  time.  Naturally  they  had  de- 
veloped a  very  high  order  of  credit  and  were  held  in 
great  esteem  and  confidence  by  the  banks  generally 
and  the  other  Board  of  Trade  firms. 

It  was  about  this  time  that  James  R.  Keene  owned 
practically  all  the  wheat  in  Chicago  and  the  lard  as 
well,  while  Baker  &  Co.  owned  most  of  the  corn.  Mr. 
Keene  and  associates  had  formed  a  combination  to 
control  the  wheat  market  and  Mr.  Keene  was  manipu- 
lating it.  J.  K.  Fisher  &  Co.  who  represented  part  of 
the  Keene  interests  in  Chicago,  had  bought  and  held 
for  him  about  three  million  bushels  of  wheat,  when 
one  morning  Mr.  A.  J.  Fisher  received  a  telephone 
message  at  the  Chicago  Club  saying  that  an  important 
night  dispatch  had  been  received  at  his  office  which 
said  "Sell  all  wheat  you  can"  (above  a  certain  price), 
and  the  dispatch  was  signed  "Keene."  Mr.  Fisher 
hurried  to  the  Board  of  Trade  and  began  disposing 
of  the  wheat  as  rapidly  as  he  could,  at  the  same  time 
telegraphing  Mr.  Keene  of  the  amounts  as  fast  as  he 
sold.  My  father  happened  to  be  in  Mr.  Keene's  office 
at  the  time  in  New  York,  and  of  course  they  were 
much  perplexed  and  disturbed  by  Mr.  Fisher's  dis- 
patches, as  they  knew  that  something  was  wrong  and 
that  probably  Mr.  Fisher  was  acting  under  instruc- 
tions contained  in  a  bogus  telegram.  As  a  check  upon 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  61 

Fisher's  operations,  therefore,  my  father's  firm,  who 
were  also  large  holders  of  wheat  bought  for  Keene, 
under  his  telegraphic  instructions  immediately  began 
buying  in  wheat  under  authority  from  Mr.  Keene  to 
replace  that  which  had  been  sold,  and  Fisher  did  not 
find  out  until  after  he  had  sold  all  of  Keene' s  holdings 
that  he  had  really  acted  without  his  orders.  Fisher, 
as  soon  as  he  knew  that  he  had  been  duped,  immedi- 
ately went  to  Mr.  Cobb  as  the  only  person  in  Chicago 
with  whom  to  trust  with  his  secret,  knowing  that  he 
had  full  information  as  to  what  he  had  done,  and  he 
therefore  gave  Baker  &  Co.  an  order  to  buy  back  all 
the  wheat  which  he  had  sold — 3,000,000  bushels — and 
this  was  done  the  next  day  by  Baker  &  Co.  at  a  slight 
profit  over  the  sales.  This  bogus  dispatch  episode 
was  one  of  the  things  that  will  always  be  remembered 
in  connection  with  Board  of  Trade  history,  and  the 
result  of  it  was  that  Fathers'  firm  thereafter  handled 
all  the  Keene  business. 

In  1 88 1  the  firm  of  William  T.  Baker  &  Co.  took 
a  large  office  in  the  corner  of  the  new  Chamber  of 
Commerce  Building  at  the  corner  of  La  Salle  Street 
and  Washington  Street,  and  in  addition  to  their  estab- 
lished grain  business,  they  opened  up  a  department  for 
buying  and  selling  stocks  and  bonds  on  the  New  York 
Stock  Exchange.  In  this  connection  the  firm  inaugu- 
rated a  private  wire  system  between  New  York  and 
Chicago,  they  being  one  of  the  first  to  attempt  such  a 
novel  and  expensive  innovation.  The  wire  cost  $25,- 
ooo  a  year  under  a  lease  from  the  Western  Union 


62  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

Telegraph  Company,  to  which  had  to  be  added  the 
expense  of  the  operator  at  both  ends  of  the  line.  They 
established  their  business  and  private  wire  connection 
in  New  York  for  their  new  department  with  McGinnis 
Bros.  &  Fearing,  who  afterwards  failed,  causing  them 
a  loss  of  $100,000.  The  next  New  York  connec- 
tion was  Jameson,  Smith  &  Cotting,  which  firm  after- 
wards became  J.  D.  Smith  &  Co.,  and  this  business 
relation  was  kept  up  as  long  as  the  business  was  con- 
tinued, and  it  proved  a  profitable  one.  It  is  said  how- 
ever, that  Father  had  no  liking  for  the  stock  business 
and  much  preferred  the  grain  trade.  As  soon  as  the 
Board  of  Trade  moved  to  its  present  location  at  the 
head  of  La  Salle  Street,  Baker  &  Co.  took  the  large 
banking  office  in  the  Counselman  Building  where  they 
remained  until  the  spring  of  1888.  Mr.  Cobb  in  this 
year  withdrew  from  the  firm,  thus  leaving  Father  alone 
in  the  business,  which  continued  under  the  style  of 
William  T.  Baker  &  Co.  as  previously.  The  relations 
of  the  two  partners  during  their  twenty  years  of 
association  were  always  of  the  pleasantest,  each  hav- 
ing the  entire  respect  and  confidence  and  friendship  of 
the  other,  and  Mr.  Cobb's  retirement  which  was  actu- 
ated by  his  desire  to  cease  the  activities  and  worries  of 
a  business  career  and  to  enjoy  life  quietly,  was  regret- 
fully yielded  to  by  his  associate.  At  the  time  of  Mr. 
Cobb's  retirement  Father  moved  his  business  head- 
quarters to  the  Phoenix  Building,  now  the  Western 
Union  Telegraph  Company  Building.  This  was  in 
1888.  He  continued  the  business  there  until  1893, 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  63 

when  he  was  elected  President  of  the  World's  Fair 
and  he  thereupon  retired  from  business  and  closed  up 
the  affairs  of  his  firm. 

He  suffered  the  usual  ups  and  downs  which  are 
apt  to  be  met  with  in  that  line  of  business.  The  firm 
began  with  practically  nothing,  and  their  combined 
assets  varying  from  time  to  time,  never  exceeded  $i,- 
000,000,  the  respective  interests  of  my  father  and  Mr. 
Cobb  being  two-thirds  and  one-third.  Father  was 
almost  invariably  a  bull  in  the  market,  and  the  persist- 
ency which  characterized  him  in  other  things  mani- 
fested itself  most  strongly  in  this  regard.  He  was 
consistent  as  well  as  persistent.  His  operations  were 
always  based  upon  a  careful  study  of  crop  conditions 
and  other  conditions  which  affected  the  price  move- 
ments. At  one  time  he  felt  that  grain  was  a  good  buy 
at  a  given  price  and  he  bought  largely.  It  crept  up 
gradually  ten  cents  higher  per  bushel,  but  it  had  not 
reached  the  mark  he  had  set  for  it.  It  slumped  and 
went  back  again  below  the  original  purchase  price, 
and  still  he  held  to  it.  It  crept  up  again,  and  again 
exceeded  ten  cents  over  the  purchase  price,  and  again 
it  slumped  to  a  lower  level  than  before,  and  still  he 
held  on.  A  third  time  the  price  stiffened  and  finally 
reached  the  high  mark  that  he  had  figured  out  for  it, 
when  he  let  go  and  made  the  profit  he  had  aimed  at. 

He  never  permitted  himself  to  be  under  obligations 
to  railroad  companies,  and  never  accepted  proffered 
passes,  but  preferred  rather  to  pay  his  freight  bills 
as  any  one  less  favored  would  have  to  do.  His  credit 


64  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

always  stood  the  hardest  test  that  could  be  put  upon 
it,  and  as  an  example  of  this  I  will  cite  the  incident  of 
the  Cincinnati  corner  some  twenty-five  years  ago, 
which  Mr.  E.  L.  Harper,  President  of  a  bank  of  that 
city  had  secretly  attempted  to  run  but  which  failed 
disastrously,  and  resulted  in  his  going  to  the  peni- 
tentiary for  stealing  the  money  to  run  the  corner. 
The  collapse  of  the  corner  resulted  in  the  failure  of 
Harpers'  bank  and  of  several  large  firms,  which 
brought  on  a  panic,  so  that  Baker  &  Co.  were  being 
sharply  called  upon  for  additional  margins  in  great 
amounts  to  protect  their  trades.  As  a  result  of  this  it 
became  apparent  to  Father  and  Mr.  Cobb  that  they 
would  go  under  if  they  were  not  provided  with  some- 
thing like  half  a  million  dollars  before  the  following 
day.  He  went  to  Mr.  Hutchinson  of  the  Corn  Ex- 
change Bank  and  explained  the  situation  and  the 
seriousness  of  it,  stating  that  they  had  to  have  that 
much  money  to  keep  them  in  business  and  preserve 
their  credit.  He  was  asked  for  a  statement  of  the 
firm's  affairs.  He  answered,  "It  would  take  three 
days  to  prepare  a  statement  and  the  relief  is  needed 
now.  I  can  only  tell  you  that  /  know  that  we  are 
solvent  and  can  soon  pay  the  loan."  The  result  was 
that  the  directors  of  the  bank  were  called  together 
quickly  to  act  in  this  emergency.  The  Executive  Com- 
mittee were  Mr.  Sidney  Kent,  Mr.  B.  P.  Hutchinson, 
familiarly  known  as  "Old  Hutch,"  and  Charles  L. 
Hutchinson.  "Old  Hutch"  was  determined  to  break 
Father  and  so  opposed  the  loan,  but  it  was  carried  by 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  65 

the  favorable  vote  of  the  other  two,  so  that  over  a 
half  million  dollars  was  passed  out  the  next  day  on 
their  overdrawn  account,  and  with  not  even  the  giv- 
ing of  a  promissory  note.  For  those  days,  this  was  a 
large  operation,  and  as  such  was  an  endorsement  not 
only  of  Father's  integrity  and  honor,  but  of  his  judg- 
ment as  well,  and  the  fact  that  the  obligation  was  half 
paid  back  in  thirty  days  and  fully  paid  back  in  sixty 
days,  vindicated  the  confidence  which  the  bank  had 
in  him. 

The  foregoing  recital  tells  briefly  the  business 
career  of  my  father  as  it  proceeded  through  the  sev- 
eral firms  with  which  he  was  identified  in  doing  busi- 
ness upon  the  Board  of  Trade.  He,  however,  did  not 
confine  his  energies  entirely  to  the  steering  of  his 
business  firm,  but  in  his  personal  capacity  was  promi- 
nent and  indefatigable  in  many  directions.  He  was 
generally  in  the  forefront  of  movements  calculated 
for  the  public  good.  He  was  one  of  the  original 
twenty-eight  charter  members  who  founded  and 
organized  the  Commercial  Club  of  Chicago  in  1887, 
a  body  of  the  strongest  and  most  select  men,  limited 
in  number  to  sixty,  which  met  monthly  at  dinner  and 
discussed  local  and  national  topics.  It  also  undertook 
important  works  and  worthy  charities,  founding 
among  other  things  the  Chicago  Manual  Training 
School.  He  was  a  member  of  the  first  executive  com- 
mittee of  the  club,  an  honor  conferred  upon  him  many 
times  since,  and  he  was  treasurer  of  the  club  in  1892, 
Vice-President  in  1893,  and  President  of  it  in  1894. 


66          LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

He  was  devoted  to  the  interests  of  this  organization 
and  was  never  absent  from  its  monthly  meetings  ex- 
cept through  illness  or  absence  from  the  city.  There 
was  seldom  a  topic  of  interest  under  discussion  by  the 
club  upon  which  he  did  not  have  pronounced  ideas 
and  was  therefore  a  frequent  speaker.  The  club  keeps 
no  records  of  the  speeches  of  its  members,  as  only 
those  of  the  invited  guests  are  reported,  but  the 
minutes  of  the  club  show  that  he  addressed  it  upon 
many  topics,  the  most  important  of  which  were: 

A  Review  of  the  World's  Fair,  Nov.  25,  1893. 

Interstate  Commerce  Law,  Feb.  27,   1894. 

Our  Currency,  Oct.  27,  1894. 

Chicago's  Municipal  Finances,  Dec.  28,   1895. 

Louisiana  Purchase  Exposition,  Dec.  27,  1902. 

He  was  also  the  principal  speaker  at  a  compli- 
mentary dinner  given  to  his  life  long  friend,  the  Hon- 
orable Lyman  J.  Gage,  February  n,  1897. 

Father  was  also  a  member  of  the  Chicago  Club  and 
the  Iroquois  Club,  and  also  of  the  Cobden  Club  of 
England.  He  was  one  of  the  original  directors  of 
the  National  Biscuit  Co.  and  continued  as  one  of  its 
most  influential  directors  until  the  time  of  his  death. 
Likewise  he  was  a  director  of  the  American  Radiator 
Co.  He  was  also  an  influential  director  of  the  Union 
National  Bank.  He  was  one  of  the  original  sub- 
scribers to  the  Chicago  Auditorium  and  active  upon 
its  directory.  He  was  a  life  member  of  the  Appollo 
Commandery  of  the  Knight  Templars,  in  which  order 
he  attained  the  32nd  degree.  He  was  an  original 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  67 

member  of  and  one  of  the  principal  pillars  of  the  Art 
Institute  of  Chicago,  and  a  member  and  director  of  the 
Chicago  Board  of  Trade.  He  was  one  of  the  most 
efficient  directors  of  the  World's  Columbian  Exposi- 
tion and  also  its  President,  and  he  also  joined  actively 
with  me  in  the  development  of  the  water  power  of 
Snoqualmie  Falls  and  the  White  River  in  the  State  of 
Washington,  for  supplying  the  cities  of  Puget  Sound 
with  electric  light  and  power,  which  ranks  among  the 
few  most  successful  and  notable  achievements  among 
the  world's  best  hydro-electric  power  developments. 
These  last  four  mentioned  subjects  should  have  more 
than  passing  notice,  and  I  will,  therefore,  give  them 
separate  chapters  in  this  history. 

Father  always  took  an  active  and  thoughtful  inter- 
est in  politics  as  a  theme  in  which  he  felt  that  as  a 
public  duty  every  patriotic  citizen  should  study  and 
have  clear  cut  ideas  upon.  He  had  no  personal  ambi- 
tions in  this  direction,  although  he  was  prominent  at 
all  times  when  national  crises  were  the  subject  of  dis- 
cussion. From  his  first  vote  and  until  the  year  when 
Mr.  James  G.  Elaine  became  a  candidate  for  Presi- 
dent he  was  always  a  Republican,  but  in  that  year  he 
foreswore  his  allegiance  to  the  Republican  party,  re- 
pudiated its  candidate  and  became  the  earnest  cham- 
pion of  Mr.  Grover  Cleveland.  He  made  speeches  in 
that  campaign,  some  of  which  were  printed  and  dis- 
tributed with  much  effect  by  the  Democratic  National 
Committee.  He  was  the  chairman  of  the  "Illinois 
Mugwump"  Committee.  He  continued  as  a  Democrat 


68  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

from  that  time  until  the  Republicans  began  to  absorb 
their  best  platform  principles  from  the  Democratic 
party,  and  until  the  Democratic  party  itself  began  to 
disavow  its  own  principles,  and  put  forward  Mr. 
Bryan  as  their  expression  of  belief.  Then  Father 
came  back  in  the  Republican  fold  again  and  there  re- 
mained for  the  remainder  of  his  life.  He  was  ardent 
for  free  trade  and  believed  that  tariff  reform  would 
cure  the  great  trust  evils. 

He  was  a  conspicuous  figure  at  the  time  of  the 
"Debs  Rebellion,"  in  which  connection  his  life  at  one 
time  was  in  great  danger.  He  had  been  on  a  visit  to 
my  home  in  Seattle  with  his  invalid  wife  and  daughter, 
and  it  happened  that  the  great  Pullman  strike  broke 
out  while  he  was  returning  to  Chicago.  At  the  com- 
mand of  Debs  who  was  President  of  the  American 
Railway  Union,  every  train  in  the  United  States  haul- 
ing Pullman  coaches  was  stopped  upon  a  given  day 
and  hour.  This  found  Father  at  Livingstone,  Mon- 
tana, where  his  train  was  stalled  for  nearly  two  weeks 
at  the  instance  of  the  strikers.  This  situation  resulted 
in  not  only  serious  inconvenience  to  the  passengers, 
but  positive  distress  in  the  lack  of  food  and  comfort, 
as  a  result  of  which  Father  was  designated  spokesman 
of  the  passengers  for  the  purpose  of  attempting  peace- 
ful negotiations  with  the  strikers  for  the  purpose  of 
allowing  them  to  proceed  upon  their  journeys  to 
their  homes.  He  addressed  them  in  a  body  at  Liv- 
ingstone, but  got  no  sympathetic  ear,  as  they  were 
acting  in  strict  obedience  to  the  edict  of  their 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  69 

leader  Debs,  whose  watchword  to  his  followers 
during  that  insurrection  was  "Save  your  money 
and  buy  a  gun!"  Finally  it  became  known  that 
Father  was  a  director  of  the  Pullman  Car  Company, 
which  excited  the  wrath  of  the  local  strikers  to  the 
extent  that  a  conspiracy  was  set  on  foot  among  them 
to  assassinate  him.  This  danger  he  escaped,  however, 
by  departing  quietly  one  night  with  his  invalid  wife 
and  daughter,  travelling  in  a  mountain  buckboard 
over  more  than  one  hundred  miles  of  almost  impass- 
able mountain  roads  to  a  distant  station  on  the  Great 
Northern  Railroad,  where  traffic  had  not  been  inter- 
rupted for  the  reason  that  that  road  was  immune  from 
the  tyranny  of  Debs  because  of  not  operating  Pullman 
rolling  stock.  When  Debs  was  tried  for  treason  and 
conspiracy,  my  father  was  invited  to  be  the  foreman 
of  the  jury  which  tried  him,  but  preferred  to  be  the 
star  witness  against  him  instead,  which  resulted  in 
the  conviction  and  imprisonment  of  Debs.  The  trial 
would  have  meant  the  hanging  of  Debs  for  murder 
had  there  been  any  fatalities  in  connection  with  the 
strike. 

After  his  retirement  from  active  business  as  a 
Board  of  Trade  firm,  Father  had  a  private  office 
in  the  Women's  Temple  Building  which  he  retained 
until  the  time  of  his  death.  He  was  not  the 
character  of  man  to  entirely  cease  his  activities,  and  he 
was,  therefore,  generally  present  at  the  Board  of 
Trade  sessions,  but  made  his  trades  through  other 
brokerage  firms. 


70  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

During  the  spring  and  summer  of  1897  Joe  Leiter 
engineered  his  world  famous  corner  in  wheat,  which 
brought  the  price  up  to  over  a  dollar  and  made  the 
farmers  very  prosperous  and  happy.  Father  was 
happy  too,  for  dollar  wheat  was  what  he  was 
looking  for,  and  therefore  being  in  the  same  situation 
and  frame  of  mind  as  the  farmer,  he  was  in  that  year 
in  connection  with  Armour,  Alerton  and  Leiter  cari- 
catured as  a  prosperous  and  contented  farmer  in  a 
cartoon  in  one  of  the  daily  papers  which  is  reproduced 
herewith.  The  Leiter  corner  failed  and  Joe  Leiter  went 
under  as  a  result  of  it,  but  there  are  a  great  many 
people  today  who  raised  wheat  in  that  year  who  still 
bless  his  memory  for  his  good  intentions  and  what  he 
did  for  them,  and  Father  himself,  undoubtedly  had  a 
kindly  feeling  for  the  part  which  young  Leiter  took 
in  the  history  of  wheat,  and  I  have  myself,  like- 
wise, for  it  undoubtedly  had  something  to  do  with 
my  own  achievement  in  the  harnessing  of  Snoqualmie 
Falls. 

Father's  fortune  at  this  time  when  he  was  fifty-six 
years  old  was  probably  about  two-thirds  of  a  million 
dollars,  and  at  no  time  before  or  since  was  it  likely 
any  greater  until  the  successful  issue  of  the  Snoqualmie 
and  White  River  power  developments  in  the  West 
resulted  in  the  practical  trebling  of  his  own  fortune 
as  well  as  adding  equally  to  mine.  He  never  set  his 
mind  on  the  swollen  fortune  idea,  caring  more  as  to 
the  method  of  attaining  an  end,  rather  than  the  attain- 
ment of  the  end  itself.  He  was  one  of  the  ablest, 


72  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

boldest  and  most  successful  operators  in  the  history 
of  the  Board  of  Trade.  He  studied  speculation  as  an 
exact  science,  founded  upon  the  laws  of  supply  and 
demand,  in  accordance  with  the  doctrine  laid  down  by 
John  Stuart  Mill,  "When  speculation  in  a  commodity 
proves  profitable  it  is  because  in  the  interval  between 
buying  and  reselling  the  price  raises  from  some  cause 
independent  of  the  speculators,  their  only  connection 
with  it  consisting  in  having  foreseen  it."  As  a  far- 
sighted  speculator  he  also  saw  how  in  the  lapse  of  an 
interval  of  time,  prices  might  shrink  instead  of  rise, 
which  situation  he  directed  likewise  to  his  own  advant- 
age. As  a  successful  speculator  he  was  a  student  of  all 
things  and  conditions  which  go  to  establish  the  law  of 
supply  and  demand.  There  was  not  a  day  in  the  year  that 
he  did  not  know  the  crop  conditions  as  they  existed  in 
all  countries  that  supply  the  grain  of  the  world.  In 
this  connection  he  studied  weather  conditions,  trans- 
portation facilities,  the  financial  situation  and  legis- 
lation. In  this  way  he  was  in  the  forefront  in  market 
movements  and  was  generally  right,  and  because  of 
his  known  shrewdness  and  close  study  of  all  condi- 
tions which  established  prices  he  had  a  large  follow- 
ing of  traders  who  relied  upon  his  judgment  in  figur- 
ing out  future  market  conditions  as  a  basis  for  their 
own  operations.  He  looked  upon  speculation  as  the  life 
of  business,  whether  it  be  trading  in  grain  or  groceries 
or  metals,  or  anything  else.  Like  him,  all  business 
men  are  speculators  for  the  reason  that  they  make  or 
buy  a  commodity  in  the  anticipation  of  being  able  to 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  73 

sell  it  at  a  profit.  A  good  business  man  is  one  who  is 
a  good  speculator.  It  is  speculation  which  electrifies 
the  intelligence  carrying  agencies  of  the  world,  so 
that  every  man  in  his  office  or  in  his  farmhouse  knows 
daily  the  changing  commercial  conditions  throughout 
the  world,  and  the  consequent  fluctuation  in  prices  of 
commodities  in  which  he  is  interested  directly  or  indi- 
rectly. It  becomes  the  regulator  of  proper  values  and 
it  stimulates  commercial  and  industrial  activities.  It 
becomes  the  pathfinder  through  all  countries  and 
markets  for  the  common  good,  disseminating  its  in- 
telligence to  all  alike.  It  is  unselfish  and  it  leads  the 
way  to  the  best  civilization.  This  is  the  view  he  took 
of  it  as  a  student,  as  an  economist,  and  as  a  practical 
and  enlightened  business  man.  His  operations  as  a 
speculator  were  not  confined  to  the  commodities  of 
the  Board  of  Trade  or  the  Stock  Exchange.  He  had 
many  of  the  attributes  of  the  hardy  pioneer  and  so 
helped  to  blaze  the  trail  to  many  a  new  country.  In 
this  way  he  became  indentified  with  early  irrigation 
projects  in  California,  with  an  extensive  railroad  pro- 
ject in  South  America,  with  coal  mining  and  water 
power  developments  in  the  State  of  Washington,  with 
copper  mining  in  the  West,  and  with  street  car  pro- 
jects in  St.  Louis. 

He  was  a  strict  adherent  to  principle  in  his  busi- 
ness affairs  even  though  he  knew  it  would  cost  him 
money  to  be  so.  As  illustrating  this  I  will  cite  the 
incident  of  his  being  one  of  a  syndicate  of  several 
operators  including  "Old  Hutch"  which  was  carrying 


74  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

a  large  line  of  grain  and  waiting  for  an  advance 
under  a  mutual  covenant  to  sell  only  in  concert  with 
each  other.  The  appreciation  in  value  of  the  com- 
modity carried,  soon  showed  a  handsome  profit  on 
paper,  and  "Old  Hutch"  without  regard  to  his  prom- 
ises to  the  others  began  to  let  go.  Others  of  the  syn- 
dicate followed  in  line  one  by  one  and  did  the  same, 
which  resulted  in  the  price  shrinking  point  by  point. 
Nevertheless  Father  held  himself  true  to  his  word, 
and  so  did  not  dispose  of  his  interest  until  he  was  the 
last  one  left,  and  until  the  price  had  dropped  in  conse- 
quence of  the  selling  movement  to  a  level  which  en- 
tirely deprived  him  of  any  profit. 

More  might  be  said  of  his  business  career  if  space 
permitted.  Let  me  instead,  however,  return  for  a 
moment  to  his  private  life  and  to  the  time  when  the 
family  moved  to  their  first  Michigan  Avenue  resi- 
dence. Father  at  that  time  was  a  master  of  the  shot- 
gun and  very  frequently  went  duck  hunting  upon  the 
preserves  of  the  Tollaston  Gun  Club  some  distance 
from  Chicago,  of  which  club  he  was  a  member.  He 
was  instinctively  a  good  shot  and  brought  home  many 
a  trophy  of  the  sport.  He  was  also  fond  of  horses 
and  drove  to  and  from  his  business  behind  one  of  the 
fastest  trotters  in  the  city,  and  he  kept  fine  carriage 
horses  and  equipages  for  the  use  of  the  family  as  well. 

Father  remained  a  widower  until  1879  when  he 
married  Mrs.  Anna  Franklin  (Phipps)  Morgan  of 
Troy,  New  York,  the  widow  of  Mr.  Azro  B.  Morgan, 
whom  he  had  met  in  the  course  of  his  business  oper- 


THE   CHICAGO   HOMESTEAD. 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  75 

ations.  They  spent  their  honeymoon  extending  over  a 
period  of  several  months,  in  European  travel.  During 
his  absence,  the  handsome  residence  at  the  corner  of 
Michigan  Avenue  and  23d  Street  was  in  course  of 
erection,  but  was  not  completed  until  several  months 
after  their  return.  Here  the  family  lived  until  some 
time  after  his  death,  with  the  exception  of  the  sum- 
mer seaspns,  which  were  spent  in  Exmoor  Cottage, 
their  summer  home  upon  the  golf  links  at  Highland 
Park.  Father  was  an  adept  and  great  devotee  of 
golf,  and  this  recreation  did  much  to  keep  him  in 
good  health  the  last  years  of  his  life.  He  looked  very 
little  older  than  his  sons  when  he  was  sixty  years  old. 
He  furnished  his  house  with  costly  works  of  art  and 
libraries,  and  while  not  ostentatious  in  arranging  his 
surroundings  and  comforts,  his  environment  was  sug- 
gestive of  the  abode  of  a  scholar  and  a  prince. 

Father's  second  wife  and  our  stepmother  came  as 
the  two  oldest  of  us  were  getting  ready  for  college, 
but  while  the  youngest  to  whom  she  was  particularly 
devoted  was  yet  a  small  boy,  so  that  she  had  more 
to  do  with  his  bringing  up  than  with  that  of  the  other 
children.  As  the  result  of  an  accident  which  was 
thought  trivial  at  the  time,  she  developed  into  an  in- 
valid, and  gradually  in  the  course  of  several  years, 
her  nervous  system  failed  and  she  became  bereft  of 
reason,  until  finally  on  October  15,  1906  she  died, — 
surviving  Father  three  years. 

The  summer  of  1903  was  as  usual  being  spent  at 
Exmoor  Cottage,  near  Highland  Park.  It  was  an 


76          LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

ideal  country  home,  with  its  colonial  style  of  archi- 
tecture, its  large  and  airy  rooms,  its  broad  verandas, 
and  the  surrounding  stately  trees.  To  this  place 
Father  would  steal  out  from  town  as  early  each  day 
as  he  could,  and  as  often  as  he  could  he  did  not  go  to 
the  city  at  all.  While  coming  down  stairs  in  the  house 
one  morning  he  stumbled  and  fell  most  of  the  dis- 
tance, and  as  a  result  he  fainted.  He  thought  noth- 
ing of  the  incident.  Then  later  he  began  to  have  pains 
which  he  attributed  to  indigestion  as  they  appeared  to 
be  in  the  region  of  the  stomach.  In  the  evening  of 
Tuesday,  October  6,  1903,  and  about  two  weeks  after 
his  fall,  he  retired  in  good  spirits  after  the  usual 
afternoon  golf  game,  the  evening  meal  and  the  game 
of  dominoes  with  the  family,  and  went  to  sleep  with  a 
hot  water  bag  to  his  breast  to  comfort  his  supposed 
disorder  of  the  stomach,  but  an  hour  later,  about  10.30 
P.  M.,  he  gave  a  slight  gasp  in  his  sleep  which  at- 
tracted the  attention  of  Mother's  nurse,  who  went  to 
him  and  discovered  that  he  was  dead.  It  was  heart 
failure.  So  unlocked  for  and  so  sudden  an  event 
came  as  a  terrible  shock  to  the  family,  excepting  his 
wife,  who  in  her  distressful  mental  condition  lived  on 
until  her  end  came  three  years  later  without  ever 
knowing  that  he  had  gone  before.  In  the  same  hour 
in  which  his  life  went  out  in  Chicago,  I  was  aroused 
from  my  sleep  2,000  miles  away  in  Seattle,  by  an 
ominous  nightmare  which  told  me  what  had  occurred, 
after  a  few  hours  of  restless  waiting,  a  messenger 
came  to  the  house  and  delivered  the  telegram  which 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  77 

confirmed  the  death  message.  The  next  day  the  Board 
of  Trade  adjourned  during  the  business  session  out 
of  respect  for  him,  a  tribute  it  had  never  paid  before 
to  any  other  member.  That  organization  felt  that 
it  had  lost  its  master  mind,  and  his  death  cast  a 
gloom  over  all.  The  community  of  Chicago  which 
had  now  grown  in  size  to  over  2,000,000  people  felt 
that  the  taking  of  him  away  was  a  distinct  loss,  for 
he  represented  the  highest  type  of  citizenship,  and  as 
such  stood  out  in  bold  relief  as  a  character  worthy  of 
the  emulation  of  his  fellow  men — those  present  and 
those  yet  to  come. 

He  left  no  will. 

The  funeral  was  held  at  the  Second  Presbyterian 
Church  on  the  following  Sunday,  and  the  interment 
was  in  the  family  lot  in  Graceland  Cemetery,  Dr.  Gun- 
saleus  officiating.  Father  had  been  a  pewholder,  and 
regular  attendant  at  this  church  since  his  second  mar- 
riage, although  not  a  member  of  it.  Prior  to  that 
time  he  had  always  attended  Christ  Reformed  Epis- 
copal Church,  ministered  by  Bishop  Cheney. 

The  death  of  William  T.  Baker,  at  the  age  of  sixty- 
two  years,  drew  from  the  daily  press  of  Chicago  and 
elsewhere,  editorials  of  eulogy  upon  the  man  of  whom 
the  whole  city  was  justly  proud  and  whose  loss  was 
the  subject  of  universal  lamentation  and  regret.  The 
different  corporations  and  institutions  in  Chicago  and 
other  cities  of  which  he  had  been  a  member,  met  in 
special  sessions  and  adopted  resolutions  of  respect  and 
affection,  which  were  engrossed  and  bound  and  sent 


78 

to  the  bereaved  family,  and  letters  from  many  friends 
and  admirers  were  received  from  different  parts  of 
the  country.  I  wish  that  space  would  permit  of  all 
their  sentiments  being  chronicled  here.  I  think  I 
ought  to  record  the  contribution  of  persons  outside  of 
kinship  as  an  expression  of  the  publics'  view  of  him, 
and  the  one  whose  statement  is  typical  of  all  the 
others,  and  who  is  ablest  of  all  to  speak  by  virtue  of 
a  lifelong  acquaintance  and  friendship  with  him  is 
Mr.  Lyman  J.  Gage,  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  under 
President  McKinley,  with  whose  tribute,  dated  Sept. 
26,  1906,  at  Point  Loma,  Cal.,  and  that  of  the  Na- 
tional Biscuit  Company,  I  will  close  this  chapter. 

"Your  letter  asking  me  for  some  facts  relating  to  your 
father's  history,  my  estimate  of  his  character,  etc.,  is  received. 
I  wish  I  could  set  forth  in  clear  language,  what  is  so  well 
portrayed  in  my  own  mind  concerning  him ; — but  this  is  the 
effect  .of  incidents,  circumstances,  associations  and  conversa- 
tions, the  particulars  of  which  cannot  be  recalled  and  described. 

Thus  I  remember  him  way  back  in  his  early  days  in 
Chicago.  He  was  young,  wide  awake,  enterprising  and 
vigorous,  firm  in  principle  and  uncompromising.  These  quali- 
ties he  showed  as  the  years  went  on — but  just  how  and  when 
this  feature  and  that  were  demonstrated,  I  cannot  recall.  I 
only  know  he  possessed  them  and  that  the  fruits  of  these 
qualities  were  seen,  appreciated  and  enjoyed  by  his  friends 
and  acquaintances.  He  was  a  lover  of  Truth  and  Justice,  and 
fearless  to  espouse  them,  when  occasion  demanded.  He  hated 
their  opposites  and  unsparingly  denounced  those  who  excused 
or  defended  these  opposites. 

These  characteristics  excited  opposition  and  bitterness 
towards  him,  and  he  could  not  escape  the  darts  of  malice 
and  defamation.  As  an  enemy  he  was  uncompromising  and 


ANNA  FRANKLIN   (PHIPPS)    (MORGAN)   BAKER. 


Ex  MOOR   COTTA<;E. 

THE   SUMMER   HOME   NEAR   HIGHLAND  PARK,   ILLS. 
IN    THIS    HOUSE    MY    FATHER    DIED. 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  79 

relentless.  As  a  friend  he  was  affectionate,  steadfast  and  true. 
It  was  my  great  privilege  to  bear  this  relation  to  him.  In 
the  year  1891  or  '92,  he  and  I  went  together  to  New  York 
to  attend  a  banquet  given  by  friends  of  the  "Columbian 
Exposition."  On  the  train  I  was  attacked  with  symptoms  of 
"Appendicitis."  As  that  trouble  had  at  that  time  received  little 
or  no  recognition,  I  was  of  course  unconscious  of  the  serious 
nature  of  my  symptoms  and  would  have  ignored  them,  but 
your  father  seemed  to  know  by  intuition  that  there  was 
trouble  ahead.  At  his  own  cost  and  without  my  knowledge, 
he  wired  to  a  physician  in  New  York  to  meet  us  on  arrival 
at  the  Holland  House.  The  doctor  diagnosed  the  trouble 
correctly  and  within  thirty  hours  I  was  under  the  surgeon's 
knife.  Needless  to  say  your  father  was  tireless  in  his  attention 
to  all  details.  He  remained  near  me  several  days,  and  I  am 
fully  -satisfied  that  to  his  foresight  in  summoning  the  doctor 
and  to  his  wise  advice  I  owe  really  my  life. 

He  was  as  prompt  to  public  duty  as  he  was  faithful  to 
private  friendship.  That  a  cause  was  unpopular, — did  not 
discourage  him  in  supporting  it.  If  it  were  popular  he  would 
not  follow  it  if  opposed  to  his  conviction. 

In  1895  (I  think  it  was)  he  accepted  the  Presidency  of  the 
Civic  Federation.  Like  all  reform  bodies,  it  was  received  with 
sneers  and  met  with  contumely.  It  required  courage  and  devo- 
tion to  assume  the  head  of  that  organization.  That  the  Feder- 
ation accomplished  a  valuable  work,  did  much  to  correct 
municipal  abuses,  and  to  harmonize  the  prejudices  of  a  diverse 
population,  would  now  be  admitted,  and  out  of  that  organiza- 
tion has  developed  "The  National  Civic  Federation"  with 
headquarters  in  New  York. 

Your  father  also  held  the  position  of  President  of  the 
"World's  Columbian  Exposition"  in  the  second  year  of  its 
history.  The  work  was  arduous  and  difficult,  but  Mr.  Baker 
found  his  way  and  contributed  much  to  the  final  triumphs  of 


80          LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

the  great  exposition,  and  for  all  his  services  so  rendered 
refused  all  salaried  compensation. 

His  active  business  life  was  related  more  closely  to  the 
Board  of  Trade.  There  his  influence  was  felt  in  the  establish- 
ment of  good  rules  and  in  the  endorsement  of  just  discipline 
for  violation. 

You  will  see  that  I  have  had  to  speak  in  general  terms 
and  my  contribution  may  not  be  of  much  service.  Whether 
or  not  you  write  his  biography,  the  influence  of  his  life  and 
character  will  not  be  lost.  'No  man  liveth  to  himself.'  His 
personality  affects  for  good  or  evil  other  lives.  The  seed 
of  the  fruit  he  produced  will  fall  into  other  hearts  and  lives, 
and  so  go  on  like  nature's  order,  producing  after  its  kind." 

The  following  testimonial  was  issued  by  the  National 
Biscuit  Company : 

'William  Taylor  Baker,  a  director  of  the  National  Biscuit 
Company,  died  at  his  country  home  near  Chicago,  on  Tues- 
day, October  6,  1903,  at  the  age  of  sixty-two  years. 

The  first  president  of  the  World's  Fair,  held  in  Chicago  in 
1893,  many  times  president  of  the  Chicago  Board  of  Trade, 
president  of  the  Civic  Federation,  vice-president  of  the  Chicago 
Bureau  of  Charities,  a  director  of  the  Chicago  Art  Institute, 
and  associated  in  an  official  capacity  with  other  public  organi- 
zations, he  was  a  patriotic  citizen,  who  sacrificed  personal 
interest  for  the  welfare  of  the  people  of  Chicago  in  particular, 
and  for  the  general  good  of  humanity  everywhere.  At  one 
time  the  largest  grain  merchant  in  the  northwest,  a  member 
of  the  board  of  directors  of  banks  and  of  various  manufac- 
turing and  mercantile  institutions  in  which  he  was  financially 
interested,  his  reputation  as  a  successful  man  of  affairs  was 
national  in  its  scope. 

It  is,  however,  as  a  large  stockholder  and  one  of  its  direc- 
tors continuously  from  its  formation,  that  the  National  Biscuit 
Company  has  had  brought  home  to  it  the  serious  loss 
occasioned  by  the  death  of  Mr.  Baker.  He  was  a  clear-headed 


CAREER  IN  CHICAGO  81 

advisor.  He  investigated  carefully  and  intelligently  the  many 
important  questions  of  policy  with  which  the  board  of  direc- 
tors of  the  company  has  had  to  deal  during  the  past  six  years. 
His  conclusions  were  always  logical.  He  saw  them  projected 
before  him  in  a  luminous  way,  distinct  in  every  detail.  When 
his  mind  was  made  up,  he  never  swerved  or  faltered.  He 
walked  straight  the  one  road  he  believed  would  lead  him  to 
his  goal.  One  of  the  first  to  appreciate  the  value  to  the  com- 
pany of  its  advertised  package  goods,  he  was  a  strenuous  and 
persistent  advocate  of  the  vital  necessity  of  making  them  the 
most  prominent  feature  of  its  business.  He  never  claimed  to 
have  any  knowledge  of  the  baking  trade,  but  this  very  fact 
made  him  all  the  more  helpful  to  those  of  his  associates  who 
had  spent  their  lifetime  in  it.  His  wide  experience  in  other 
lines  gave  him  a  point  of  view  denied  to  them,  as  a  man  stand- 
ing miles  away  from  tall  mountain  peaks  sees  conformations 
sharply  outlined  against  the  distant  sky  which  are  invisible 
to  the  dwellers  at  their  base. 

The  chief  characteristics  of  William  T.  Baker  were  rigid 
honesty  and  the  moral  courage  to  assert  and  maintain  his  con- 
victions. He  was  true  hearted.  In  his  family  life  he  was  one 
of  the  most  tender  and  unselfish  of  men.  Dignified,  courteous, 
and  of  unfailing  good  humor,  he  was  the  ideal  gentleman  in 
business.  His  influence  and  example  will  live  long  in  the 
memory  of  his  fellow  directors,  each  of  whom  was  proud  to 
call  him  friend. 

He  has  gone  to  the  reward  God  has  prepared  for  just  men." 


c 


O 


CHAPTER  IV. 

ELIZA  ANNIE  DUNSTER. 
1838-1873. 

EVEN  as  my  father's  life  would  have  been  in- 
complete without  my  mother  who  helped 
make  him  the  man  that  he  was,  so  would  his 
biography  be  only  half  done  without  more  than 
a  reference  to  her.  She  came  into  his  life  at  the 
threshold  of  his  career  in  Chicago  and  brought  with 
her  all  those  talents  and  attributes  best  calculated  to 
sustain  him  in  the  realization  of  his  fondest  hopes  and 
ambitions.  I  made  a  pilgrimage  last  summer  to  the 
scenes  of  her  girlhood  similar  to  the  one  I  made  to 
those  of  my  father,  for  I  felt  the  same  devotion  to  each 
of  them,  and  neither  exploration  interested  me  less 
than  did  the  other.  But  like  all  mothers,  my  mother 
was  a  woman,  and  being  a  woman  she  became  a  wife, 
and  like  most  wives  her  glory  thereafter  was  to  shine 
in  the  reflected  light  of  her  husband,  as  the  better 
half  of  him,  or  as  the  world  looks  at  it,  his  satellite, 
Her  sphere  was  their  home,  while  his  was  the  whole 
world.  Therefore  by  the  nature  of  things  and  events 
he  was  the  larger  luminary  and  she  the  lesser  one, 
and  hence  in  this  biography  there  must  needs  be  more 
told  of  him  and  less  of  her.  Had  she  remained  un- 
married, it  is  quite  likely  that  her  gifts  and  accomp- 


84          LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

lishments  would  have  entitled  her  to  an  independent 
biography  without  the  excuse  for  its  justification  in 
the  being  the  wife  of  a  great  man.  How  truly  it  has 
been  said — "There  is  a  tide  in  the  affairs  of  men, 
which  taken  at  its  flood  leads  on  to  fortune,"  and  truer 
still,  'There  is  a. tide  in  the  affairs  of  women,  which 
taken  at  its  flood  leads  God  knows  where."  But  what 
grander  destiny  can  any  woman  have  than  wifehood 
and  motherhood? 

She  was  Eliza  Annie  Dunster,  the  youngest  child 
of  Samuel  and  Susan  Dunster,  born  October  24,  1838, 
on  a  farm  at  Durham,  New  Hampshire,  a  village  of 
only  a  few  families,  at  that  time.  She  came  from  a 
sturdy  line.  The  first  Dunster  in  this  country  came 
over  from  England  in  1640,  and  he  was  Henry  Dun- 
ster, a  learned  and  devoted  Minister  of  the  Gospel, 
a  son  of  Henry  Dunster  of  Lancastershire,  England. 
His  most  conspicuous  place  in  history  lies  in  the  fact 
that  he  was  the  first  President  of  Harvard  University, 
and  assisted  John  Harvard  in  the  founding  of  it. 
President  Dunster  was  educated  at  Cambridge  Uni- 
versity, England,  which  also  gave  to  the  world  an- 
other of  Harvard's  presidents,  President  Chauncey, 
as  well  as  John  Winthrop  and  John  Cotton  of  early 
Massachusetts,  and  such  notable  characters  as  Bacon, 
Milton,  Dryden,  Jeremy  Taylor,  Newton,  Pitt,  Byron, 
McCauley,  Tennyson,  Gray,  Wordsworth  and  Thack- 
ery, — a  brilliant  setting  indeed  for  the  name  of  my 
first  American  maternal  ancestor.  His  administration 
as  President  of  Harvard  while  this  school  was  in  its 


ELIZA  ANNIE  DUNSTER  85 

infancy,  was  eminently  successful  for  fifteen  years, 
at  the  end  of  which  period  he  was  compelled  to  resign 
because  of  views  which  he  held  in  regard  to  infant 
baptism  which  were  too  advanced  for  those  times  and 
which  caused  him  to  be  pronounced  a  heretic.  His 
fearlessness  and  courage  in  his  beliefs  showed  him  to 
be  no  less  a  martyr  than  if  he  had  been  burned  at  the 
stake.  He  died  in  1659,  and  he  now  lies  in  the  ancient 
cemetery  opposite  the  college  grounds  in  Cambridge, 
held  down  by  a  weighty  Latin  inscription  and  a  slab 
of  stone. 

History  does  not  record  that  the  Dunster  family 
achieved  great  fame  in  the  Revolutionary  War.  It 
does  say,  however,  that  my  great  grandfather  was  a 
private  in  the  Revolutionary  War,  and  in  the  printed 
genealogy  of  the  family  about  an  inch  of  space  is  given 
to  his  heroic  exploits,  while  over  a  page  is  given  to 
his  attempt  at  procuring  a  Revolutionary  pension.  It 
seems  that  under  the  rules  then  existing,  pensions 
were  only  given  to  those  who  were  really  needy  and 
could  show  good  proofs  of  being  paupers.  My  Revo- 
lutionary sire  claimed  that  honor  and  a  pension,  but 
upon  investigation  it  was  found  that  he  possessed 
assets  consisting  of  a  table  worth  $1.25  and  a  chair 
worth  25  cents,  total  assets  of  $1.50,  and  so  he  failed 
in  his  pension  claim.  There  is  also  a  pair  of  great 
iron  handcuffs  locked  and  unlocked  by  a  big  iron  key, 
which  an  ancestor  of  mine  through  this  line  wore  for 
some  purpose,  either  as  a  civil  prisoner  or  a  military 
one,  but  I  have  no  data  to  determine  which  of  the 


86  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

two  types  he  belonged  to,  although  my  warlike  spirit 
leads  me  to  hope  it  was  the  latter. 

Samuel  Dunster,  my  grandfather,  of  the  sixth  gen- 
eration since  the  emigrant  ancestor,  was  born  in 
Mason  Village,  New  Hampshire,  August  I,  1803, 
which  place  I  visited  last  summer.  He  went  to  school 
eight  weeks  in  winter,  and  ten  weeks  in  summer  at  a 
small  district  school  and  worked  the  rest  of  the  time, 
so  that  at  the  age  of  sixteen  he  had  not  yet  learned 
arithmetic  or  geography.  He  then  attended  an 
academy  for  six  weeks  and  finished  his  education.  He 
became  a  house  carpenter  and  later  on  a  machinist, 
in  the  meantime  devoting  his  spare  time  to  practical 
self-education,  and  thus  became  a  surveyor  of  land, 
doing  engineering  work  in  his  own  and  adjacent  vil- 
lages. Later  he  became  a  calico  printer  with  more  or 
less  varied  success,  his  aptitude  being  however  more  in 
mechanical  lines  than  in  commercial  pursuits.  He 
lived  successively  in  Dover,  New  Hampshire,  and  in 
Durham,  about  five  miles  distant,  at  which  latter  place 
he  owned  a  farm  upon  which  still  stands  the  little 
house  in  which  my  mother  was  born,  which  is  unused 
and  neglected  today  as  I  saw  it.  He  also  lived  in 
Providence,  Rhode  Island,  superintending  a  calico 
print  works  there,  and  finally  settled  down  near  Attle- 
boro,  Massachusetts,  upon  a  small  farm  where  he 
passed  the  remainder  of  his  days,  and  where  he  died 
in  1887.  His  wife,  my  grandmother,  was  Susan  Per- 
kins Dow,  born  July  27,  1806,  in  Hollis,  Maine,  and 
whose  parents  were  among  the  early  settlers  of  Dover. 


ELIZA  ANNIE  DUNSTER  87 

She  died  a  few  years  before  her  husband,  and  both 
of  them  were  buried  in  the  Dunster  lot  at  Mason  Vil- 
lage. 

Returning  now  to  my  mother ; — her  early  girlhood 
was  spent  in  Dover,  and  there  are  people  living  there 
still  who  remember  her  as  a  girl  of  remarkable  intel- 
lectuality, full  of  fun,  and  very  bright  and  attractive 
in  many  ways.  Physically  she  was  of  the  petite  order, 
round  and  plump  very  much  in  looks  and  figure  like 
her  daughter  Bertha.  A  lady  there  whom  I  met,  said 
with  a  twinkle  in  her  eye  after  describing  my  mother's 
looks  and  accomplishments,  and  observing  that  I  did 
not  much  resemble  her,  "I  guess  though  she  acted 
much  like  you."  She  loved  her  parents  and  family 
and  friends  with  a  whole  heart,  and  she  was  loved  by 
all  in  return  as  ardently  as  she  herself  loved.  The 
house  her  family  lived  in  is  still  there,  and  it  gave 
me  great  pleasure  to  visit  it  and  go  through  the  sev- 
eral rooms,  where  she  romped  about  as  a  girl.  While 
the  family  lived  in  Providence,  my  mother  attended 
the  public  school  there,  passing  through  all  the  grades 
up  to  the  high  school  to  which  she  was  promoted.  She 
did  not  know  what  it  was  to  have  the  blues,  and  she 
made  light  of  the  troubles  which  would  depress  an 
ordinary  person.  "What  matter  does  it  make,"  she 
would  say,  "we  will  all  be  dead  in  a  hundred  years." 

While  she  was  in  the  public  schools  at  this  time,  and 
in  the  twelfth  year  of  her  age,  she  kept  a  diary,  or  a 
"journal"  as  she  called  it,  which  is  very  neatly  written 
in  her  own  handwriting,  and  which  is  still  preserved. 


88  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

As  this  journal  reflects  her  young  girl  mode  of  think- 
ing, and  gives  strong  suggestions  as  well  of  the  liter- 
ary talent  which  she  developed  later,  it  may  be  of 
interest  to  copy  here  a  few  pages  from  it : — 

"Friday,  March  27th,  1851.  This  afternoon  a  girl  came 
in  with  her  head  bleeding  dreadfully.  Someone  had  fired  a 
stone  anjd  had  hit  her  on  the  head.  I  think  it  is  too  bad 
that  the  boys  should  throw  stones.  Miss  Bancroft  went  down 
cellar  with  her  and  fixed  her.  Mr.  Keith  asked  the  boys 
about  it  but  none  of  them  would  own  it.  We  did  not  recite 
in  Geography  this  afternoon  or  Reading.  Mr.  Keith  looked 
at  our  Journals  this  afternoon.  I  do  not  expect  Marion  over 
tonight  for  it  is  not  her  turn.  The  weather  is  very  warm  to- 
day. May  is  quite  sick  today.  The  baby  is  about  the  same 
as  ever.  Recited  all  of  my  lessons  correctly." 

"Tuesday,  March  1st,  1851.  There  I  have  made  a  mistake. 
I  believe  it  is  April  1st,  but  I  shall  not  scratch  it  out  and  alter 
it  for  father  does  not  wish  me  to.  I  have  not  been  April  fooled 
yet  but  I  have  April  fooled  Mary  Northrep.  It  is  very  pleas- 
ant today.  Our  washwoman  came  today  and  brought  her 
little  baby.  She  is  10  months  old.  My  baby  is  about  the 
same.  She  does  not  grow  any.  I  wish  she  was  smart  like 
other  children.  I  missed  in  Geography  this  afternoon.  I 
got  April  fooled  by  Emily  Winsor  this  afternoon.  I  will  here 
copy  a  piece  of  poetry  which  I  made  about  the  school  a  good 
while  ago. 

If  one  of  the  scholars  breaks  the  rule 

Of  Mr.  Keith's  large  Grammar  School, 

They  have  to  go  and  bring  the  stick 

Which  makes  the  tears  flow  down  so  quick. 

They  feel  as  if  they  were  a-flying 

While  they  go  to  their  seats  a-crying. 

But  when  their  shedding  tears  are  over 

They  begin  to  look  so  very  sober 


ELIZA  ANNIE  DUNSTER  89 

They  soon  get  very  tired  and  weary, 

And  then  get  up  their  good  old  cheery, 

Which  makes  them  go  and  bring  the  stick 

And  then  they  have  a  harder  lick, 

And  I  do  not  think  it  more  than  fair 

For  the  stick  to  be  raised  high  as  their  hair." 
"Monday,  June  2nd.  Today  is  the  first  day  of  the  term. 
I  recited  in  Reading  this  afternoon.  Mr.  Keith  let  all  the 
first  class  go  to  the  High  School  and  Frederic  Bacheldor. 
He  did  not  get  in.  I  do  not  know  what  girls  have  got  in. 
We  had  quite  a  shower  this  afternoon.  I  spent  the  vacation 
very  pleasantly.  I  was  over  to  Marion's  part  of  the  time  and 
the  rest  of  the  time  she  was  up  to  my  house.  I  hope  I  shall 
have  a  higher  seat  this  term.  I  guess  I  will  make  some  reso- 
lutions which  I  shall  try  and  keep  this  term.  I  will  write 
them  on  the  opposite  page. 

Resolved — 

1st,    that  I  will  not  talk  neither,  make  letters  with  my 
fingers. 

2nd,  study  my  lessons. 

3rd,  write  as  good  as  I  can  in  my  journal. 

4th,    sit  up  or  study  when  my  teacher  tells  me  to. 

5th,   not  turn  around  in  my  seat  unless  I  forget  it. 

6th,    not  eat  anything  in  school. 

7th,    not  write  to  anyone  on  my  slate. 

8th,    will  not  copy  my  sums  from  another's  slate. 

9th,    will  strive  to  keep  all  my  resolutions." 

It  was  at  this  time  the  family  moved  to  Dover, 
and  then  she  went  to  a  little  school  called  Franklin 
Academy  a  picture  of  which  is  shown  in  this  book. 
This  school  has  since  been  torn  down  to  give  place 
to  a  manufacturing-  structure.  At  this  time,  she  was 
fifteen  years  of  age,  when  her  father  although  of  most 
modest  means,  sent  her  to  Bradford  Academy,  a  select 


90  LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

finishing  school  for  girls,  in  Bradford,  Massachusetts, 
on  account  of  her  unusual  aptitude  in  her  studies  and 
her  ambition  for  a  more  complete  education.  At  this 
academy  she  remained  for  the  full  term  of  four  years, 
and  graduated  therefrom  in  1856  at  the  head  of  her 
class,  although  the  youngest  in  it.  This  academy  has 
since  grown  to  be  a  much  larger  school  and  has  moved 
from  its  ancient  quarters  to  a  more  pretentious  and 
modern  building.  I  visited  the  old  school  and  the  new 
one  in  the  adjoining  block,  and  made  myself 
acquainted  with  the  teaching  staff,  and  the  equipment 
and  the  curriculum  of  the  present  day.  The  teachers 
took  a  very  genuine  interest  in  my  coming  for  the 
purpose  of  looking  up  the  traditions  of  my  mother, 
and  they  very  gladly  looked  up  the  records  and  the 
old  catalogues,  wherein  they  found  her  chronicled 
with  the  rest  of  the  girls  of  her  time.  It  pleased  me 
to  see  the  school  and  the  young  ladies  there,  and  to 
imagine  how  fifty  years  ago  she  tripped  about  as 
gayly  and  happily  as  did  those  young  ladies  whom  I 
saw,  and  studied  as  hard  as  they  did  or  vice  versa, 
and  looked  as  pretty  or  prettier. 

My  mother  as  a  girl  was  remarkably  fond  of  Latin 
and  Geometry,  and  could  demonstrate  from  memory 
every  theorem  in  the  first  four  books  of  Euclid.  At  her 
graduation  from  Bradford  Academy,  she  wrote  the 
parting  hymn,  which  in  that  institution  was  equivalent 
to  the  valedictory  of  a  college  course.  After  her 
graduation  from  this  academy,  she  went  to  Mrs.  Wil- 
lard's  school,  at  Troy,  New  York,  finishing  a  short 


ELIZA  ANNIE  DUNSTER  91 

term  there,  and  then  fired  with  a  great  ambition  to 
make  her  own  way,  she  went  to  St.  Charles,  Illinois, 
and  secured  a  position  as  school  teacher.  It  was  at 
this  place  that  she  so  distinguished  herself  for  scholar- 
ship and  ability  that  it  led  to  her  being  selected  by 
the  Amite  Female  Academy  at  Liberty,  Mississippi,  as 
an  instructor  in  English  Literature  and  other  branches 
which  were  taught  in  that  institution. 

It  was  about  this  time  that  important  events  lead- 
ing up  to  the  Civil  War  were  transpiring  in  the  coun- 
try, and  situated  as  she  was  in  Mississippi,  she  was 
quite  within  the  arena  where  the  anti-bellum  troubles 
were  rapidly  crystalizing  into  that  great  and  terrible 
war  which  was  soon  to  divide  the  nation  against  itself. 
As  a  result  of  these  trying  times,  the  Amite  Seminary 
was  dissolved  and  she  then  pursued  her  course  north- 
ward again,  going  this  time  to  Chicago,  where  she 
soon  became  a  teacher  in  the  public  schools.  In  top- 
ical subjects  which  formed  a  prominent  part  of  the 
exercises  there,  she  raised  her  particular  school  to  a 
higher  standard  than  any  other  in  the  city.  Her 
career  as  teacher  ended  with  her  marriage  to  my 
father. 

My  mother  was  remarkably  gifted  in  a  literary 
way,  and  early  in  childhood  she  manifested  a  pro- 
nounced fondness  for  standard  poetry  and  an  aptitude 
for  verse  of  her  own  creation,  which  talent  she  im- 
proved or  neglected  according  to  impulse.  Poetic 
taste  and  appreciation  is  good  for  the  soul  and  reflects 
a  person's  higher  nature  such  as  hers  was  and  she 


92          LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

indulged  it  frequently.  At  Bradford  Academy  she 
wrote  several  pieces  for  the  "Olive  Branch,"  a  paper 
published  by  the  girl  students  and  of  which  she  was 
in  her  turn  the  editor.  At  Chicago,  for  two  years  she 
wrote  the  annual  New  Year's  Carrier's  Address  for 
the  Chicago  Tribune,  which  took  the  form  of  a  supple- 
ment sent  out  with  the  New  Year's  edition  each  year, 
which  recited  in  verse  the  most  important  history  of 
the  year  pertaining  to  the  nation  at  large,  but  more 
particularly  to  Chicago.  This  practice,  I  believe,  has 
long  since  been  discontinued.  At  that  time  the  matter 
was  the  subject  of  competition  open  to  the  public,  the 
reward  to  the  person  successful  in  presenting  the 
best  poem  being  $100,  which  as  stated  before,  my 
mother  won  twice.  One  of  her  poems  she  wrote  in  its 
entirety  the  night  before  she  delivered  it,  for  the  set 
purpose  of  earning  money  to  buy  Father  a  beautiful 
ring  for  a  Christmas  present.  The  Chicago  Tribune 
was  the  leading  Republican  paper  of  the  West,  and  in 
her  address  which  enabled  her  to  buy  the  ring  she  re- 
viewed the  political  situation  with  the  tact  of  an  old 
campaign  leader.  In  1867  the  submarine  cable  across 
the  Atlantic  Ocean  was  successfully  laid,  and  the 
tunnel  supplying  water  to  the  city  of  Chicago  from  a 
crib  two  miles  out  in  Lake  Michigan  had  been  com- 
pleted, and  these  events  she  thus  notices  in  her 
address : — 
"What  has  last  year  left  as  dowry  to  the  hand-maids,  Science, 

Art? 
Ah !  how  rife  with  grand  achievements  is  the  Scientific  part ! 


ELIZA  ANNIE  DUNSTER  93 

Buried  in  the  ocean's  bosom,  down  below  the  mighty  deep, 
'Mid  the  wreck  of  myriad  vessels,  where  their  human  cargoes 

sleep, 
Darts  the   lightnings,   chained  and   tempered,  guided   by   a 

single  thread, 
And  from  Europe  to  our  own  land,  instant  weal  or  woe  is 

read. 
Wondrous  triumph  of  a  genius !    Whispered  words  are  eager 

caught, 
Through  abyss  of  depth  unfathomed,  news  and  rumors  now 

are  brought. 
Europe  bids  the  States  "Good  morning" ;  Liverpool  doth  New 

York  greet, 
Fast  Chicago  joins  the  refrain,  Commerce  asks  the  price  of 

wheat ; 
So  the  'Cable'  prates  and  gossips,  spinning  out  the  watery 

miles, 
And  the  'mermaids'  laugh  and  listen,  laving  it  with  dripping 

smiles. 
Fact!    it  seems  there's  nothing  left  now;  Science  may  her 

hands  but  fold. 

Wonder  if  the  future  ages  can  excel  our  doings  bold ! 
At  some  distant  'Happy  New  Year'  will  Orion's  glittering 

belt, 

Gossiped  be  in  star-hung  Cables,  and  his  salutations  felt? 
Shall  the  growling  'Ursa-Major'  send  dispatches  to  the  earth, 
An/1   the    'Pleiads'   hunt   their    Sister,    telegraphing   of   her 

worth  ? 

Nor  forget  we  great  Chicago,  mighty  umpire  of  the  West, 
Wreathe  for  her  distinguished  honor,  for  she  leadeth  all  the 

rest. 

Queen  she  is  of  all  the  cities;  Commerce,  Art,  Religion,  too, 
Here  have  built  their  proudest  temples,  mammoth  structures 

rise  to  view 


94          LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

As  by  magic,  and,  completed,  always  are  the  largest,  best, 
Spite  of  foreign  grunts  and  envies,  spite  of  Eastern  sneers 
and  jest. 

5):^;^:^:*^:^**** 

Who  but  she  has  wrought  a  'Tunnel'  poising  lakes  upon  its 

back, 

Never  resting  till  she  brought  us  crystal  waters  o'er  its  track  ? 
Now  farewell !  ye  slimy  waters !  fluid  of  most  dubious  look ! 
Henceforth  shall  our  drink  be  limpid,  lucid  as  the  babbling 

brook. 

Here  'aclieux'  we  make  in  parting,  to  our  piscatory  friends ; 
Showers  of  blessings,  not  of  fishes,  happily  not  the  'Tunnel' 

sends." 

And  again,  and  upon  the  occasion  of  the  reunion 
of  Bradford  Academy  graduates  at  the  home  of  Miss 
Oilman,  the  former  principal,  at  Boston,  she  read  the 
following  clever  poem  which  she  had  composed  for  the 
occasion  and  which  was  afterwards  printed  and  distri- 
buted among  the  graduates.  This  poem  is  well  worth 
reading,  not  only  for  its  literary  merit,  but  as  a  display 
of  her  womanly  instincts  and  her  wife-like  senti- 
ments : — 

TO  ALL  GREETING. 

Reminiscence !     Reminiscence ! 

Blessings  on  the  word  and  gift; 
Praises  to  the  Heavenly  Author, 

Gladly  for  this  day  we  lift — 
That  in  History,  thro'  life's  mistery, 

He  hath  painted  pleasant  scenes 
Thus  with  gladness,  yet  with  sadness 

We  come  back  to  olden  dreams. 


ELIZA  ANNIE  DUNSTER  95 

Lay  aside  the  veil  of  "Present," 

Stand  upon  the  ancient  shore, 
Girlhood's  hopes  and  youthful  visions, 

Which  we  had  in  days  of  yore, 
Rise  before  us,  with  the  chorus 

Of  a  hundred  happy  hearts ; 
Little  dreaming  of  the  seeming 

Of  this  "Future's"  sober  parts. 

Back  with  trembling  step  we  wander, 

Thro'  old  halls  so  rife  with  scene, 
Here  and  there  to  dream  and  ponder, 

From  each  nook,  a  thought  to  glean. 
Olden  beauties — troublous  duties — 

Make  us  smile  or  fret  in  turn ; 
These  recalling,  rising,  falling, 

Change  our  hearts,  with  chill  or  burn. 

Can  it  be  but  yester-even, 

That  the  brain-wrought,  weary  head, 
Heard  with  joy,  that  bell  of  omen, 

Summon  all  while  prayer  was  said? 
O  that  blessing !   then  caressing 

Each  loved  form  that  bent  to  hear, 
Still  we're  listening,  eyelids  glistening, 

With  soft  reminiscent  tear ! 

Many  a  voice  that  worshipped  with  us, 

Hushed  is  now — nor  rises  here — 
Each  of  us  can  trace  the  vacant, 

Lonesome  place  of  memory's  dear. 
Yet  in  glory,  pure  and  holy. 

Stand  those  sister  spirits  now. 
Far  above  us,  still  they  love  us, 

If  to  earth.  Heaven's  own  mav  bow. 


LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

Yet  why  dim  this  festive  hour 

With  the  saddened  thoughts  that  rise? 
Fondly  let  sweet  memory's  bower 

Revel  here  in  pleasant  ties, 
Let  us  laughing,  ever  quaffing, 

Happy  cups  from  "Auld  Lang  Syne," 
Intermingle;  merry  jingle; 

With  the  silver  bells  of  Time. 

Let  us  smile  at  early  "castles," 

Queer,  fantastic,  girlhood's  dreams, 
Melted  now  to  "airy  nothings," 

With  their  gorgeous  tinsel  gleams. 
Olden  picture ! — Present  mixture ! 

Let  us  turn  from  that,  to  this — 
Curious  scatterings !  furious  batterings ! 

Yet  here's  larger  love  and  bliss ! 
Mayhap  old  heroes  have  turned  "Neros," 

Or  temple  "niche"  of  fickle  "Fame," 
Has  but  refused  us,  or  abused  us, 

Denying  e'er  illustrious  name. 

Alas!   how  once  with  thrill  ecstatic 

In  our  wondrous  journals  then, 
Did  we  depict  our  glorious  Future 

With  the  girl's  romantic  pen. 
Every  one  to  wealth,  or  glory, 

Heroine,  or  hero's  wife, 
We  turn — sublime,  contrasting  story, 

To  the  present  earnest  life. 

Plain  John  Smith  has  proven  hero, 
The  niche  in  Fame  has  been  a — crib ! 

Women's  lives  have  all  turned  out  so, 
Since  Adam  old  first  lost  a  "rib" ! 


ELIZA  ANNIE  DUNSTER  97 

Few  move  out  of  narrow  orbit, 

Or  shine  but  with  reflected  light; 
Occasionally  a  restless  "comet" 

Soars  aloft  with  reckless  flight. 
But  with  "trailing"  comes  a  wailing, 

"Woman's  Sphere"  is  wailed  by  men, 
"Homo"  pulling  at  the  "check  rein," 

She  soon  drops  down  to  home  again! 

Still  which  mother,  would  seek  other 

Brighter  jewels  for  her  life. 
Bless  our  children!  bless  our  darlings! 

Blessings  on  the  name  of  wife ! 
Precious  are  our  Pearls  and  Rubies, 

Eternal  is  the  mother's  crown, 
Paradise  but  opened  to  us, 

When  old  "castles"  tumbled  down. 

Many,  too,  have  fought  with  honor, 

In  the  pedagogic  field, 
Brains  have  worked  o'er  brainless  pupils, 

'Neath  the  patient  learning's  shield, 
So  she  bearing  once  our  wearing, 

Trying  acts  and  hapless  pranks, 
Still  hath  bravely  passed  thus  safely 

Up  the  honored  classic  ranks. 

She  who  tasked  us,  now  hath  asked  us, 

Back  from  busy  life,  or  sport, 
Again  to  meet  her,  and  to  greet  her, 

With  life's  story  and  report. 
As  those  soldiers  summoned  forward 

By  the  voice  that  led  the  host, 
Fervently  with  heart  responded, 

As  they  marched  with  joyful  toast. 


98          LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

"We  are  coming,  Abraham,  Father, 
With  a  hundred  thousand  strong." 

So  from  East  and  West  we  answer, 

With  like  fervor,  love  and  song, 
"We  are  coming,  Alma  Mater, 

Coming  back  to  scenes  of  yore, 
Come  to  greet  thee,  still  loved  teacher, 

Ere  the  "vesper"  hour  is  o'er. 
Come  reciting  of  our  loved  ones, 

Come  to  tell  thee  of  our  lives, 
Come  to  beg  thee  bless  our  darlings, 

Come  as  true  and  honest  wives. 
Come  to  tell  of  these,  our  glories, 

Come  to  lisp  our  trials,  too. 
Come  to  whisper,  gentle  Teacher, 

Many  a  solemn  passage  through. 

And  when  each  shall  say  her  lesson, 

Matron,  maiden,  mother,  wife, 
Each  one  give  her  present  "abstract," 

Of  this  riper,  nobler  life, 
Thou  shalt  "mark"  us,  "Smiths,"  "Jones,"  "Parkers," 

With  that  faithful  hand  of  yore, 
Not  severely,  but  as  nearly 

As  thou  can'st,  please  "mark"  us  "4." 

With  her  girlhood  spent  among  the  hills  of  New 
Hampshire,  and  with  all  the  inspirations  that  the  best 
of  nature  could  afford,  it  is  not  to  be  wondered  at  that 
if  she  had  poetic  talent  it  should  find  early  demonstra- 
tion. The  whole  environment  was  poetical.  Hardly 
a  stone's  throw  away  lived  the  poet  John  G.  Whittier, 
who  stirred  the  country  with  his  verses  in  a  manner 


ELIZA  ANNIE  DUNSTER  99 

that  will  endure  for  all  time.  She  lived  in  an  age  of 
poets,  and  in  a  country  seared  with  the  patriotic  his- 
tory of  the  two  first  American  wars.  Not  far  from 
the  birthplace  of  her  father,  and  only  a  few  rods  from 
his  final  burying  place  is  situated  a  humble  little  cot- 
tage, called  "Uncle  Sam's  House."  This  is  the 
original  birthplace  and  abode  of  Samuel  Wilson,  from 
whom  the  character  of  "Uncle  Sam"  as  impersonat- 
ing the  United  States  of  America,  was  derived.  Dur- 
ing the  War  of  1812,  he  was  a  government  contrac- 
tor living  at  Troy,  New  York,  furnishing  supplies  to 
the  army.  The  consignments  sent  out  by  him  to  the 
government  were  all  branded  "U.  S.,"  and  as  he  was 
familiarly  called  "Uncle  Sam,"  to  distinguish  him 
from  his  brother  who  was  called  "Uncle  Ned,"  it  soon 
grew  into  practice  for  all  government  goods  to  be 
dubbed  as  "Uncle  Sam's."  U.  S.  stood  for  him  and 
U.  S.  stood  for  the  country  too,  so  in  time  this  real 
and  living  Uncle  Sam  came  to  stand  figuratively  for 
the  United  States  Nation,  not  only  in  the  army,  but 
later  throughout  the  whole  country,  and  the  people 
have  been  pleased  to  keep  it  up.  Whether  the  real 
"Uncle  Sam"  really  looked  the  way  he  is  characterized 
or  not,  is  not  known.  He  died  in  1844. 

My  mother  was  romantic,  as  was  my  father,  and 
no  better  demonstration  of  this  can  be  had  than  the 
particular  event  of  their  marriage.  It  seems  that  he 
had  been  "waiting  on  her"  for  something  over  a  year 
with  the  usual  attentions  of  an  ardent  lover,  when  on 
the  5th  day  of  July,  1862,  they  happened  to  go  on  a 


100        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

railroad  excursion  and  picnic  to  Beloit,  Wisconsin, 
which  is  not  a  very  long  ride  from  Chicago.  The 
occasion  was  one  of  great  merriment  and  joy  to  all 
who  went.  Some  one  suggested  as  a  feature  of  the 
outing,  while  they  were  all  in  the  midst  of  their 
luncheon,  that  they  have  a  wedding.  Boys,  girls  and 
chaperones  all  fell  in  with  the  idea,  as  one  that 
would  lend  unusual  interest  to  the  day.  The  senti- 
ment was  unanimous.  But  who  would  they  have  to 
get  married?  In  response  to  the  call  for  volunteers, 
my  mother  and  father  came  forward,  and  were  upon 
that  day  and  on  the  spot  united  in  marriage  by  the 
Rev.  Dr.  H.  N.  Brinsmade,  of  Beloit.  It  is  of  course, 
quite  likely  that  their  minds  had  been  made  up  to 
this  end  some  time  before  the  happy  event  really  took 
place. 

At  this  point  should  be  mentioned  the  children 
which  came  to  William  Taylor  Baker  and  Eliza  Annie 
Dunster  through  this  union. 

1.  William  Dunster  Baker,  named  for  his  father  and  his 
maternal  grandfather,  Samuel  Dunster,  was  born  at  Attleboro, 
Massachusetts,  September  12,  1863.    He  was  a  frail  and  sickly 
baby  and  his  mother  was  unable  to  give  him  the  health  and 
strength  necessary  to  prolong  his  life.     He  died  July  27th, 
1864,  at  the  age  of  10  months  and  15  days,  and  was  buried  in 
Graceland  Cemetery,  Chicago. 

2.  Charles   Hinckley   Baker — the  author  of  this  book — 
named  in  honor  of  his  father's  first  Chicago  employer  and 
subsequent  partner,  Charles  Hinckley,  was  born  in  Chicago, 
November  30,  1864.     He  was  educated  at  Cornell  University, 
from  which  he  was  graduated  with  honors  as  a  civil  engineer 
in  June,  1886.     He  at  once  entered  railroad  engineering  and 


SAMUEL  DUNSTER. 


ELIZA  ANNIE   (DUNSTER)    BAKER. 


LESLIE  D.  F.  BAKER.  WM.  T.  BAKER,  JR. 

DOROTHY  ELIZABETH   BAKER. 


GRANDCHILDREN    OF    WM.    T.    BAKER    AND    CHILDREN    OF    THE    AUTHOR. 


ELIZA  ANNIE  DUNSTER  101 

construction  work  in  Dakota  for  the  Chicago  &  Northwestern 
Railway  at  $30  a  month,  which  lasted  a  year,  and  he  then 
went  to  Seattle,  Washington,  and  engaged  in  the  same  line 
of  work  for  the  Seattle,  Lake  Shore  &  Eastern  Railroad. 
After  three  years  he  resigned  and  opened  a  private  engineering 
office,  which  later  developed  into  a  contracting  business  for 
railroad  and  water  works  construction.  From  1898  to  1904 
he  projected  and  built,  in  partnership  with  his  father,  the 
Snoqualmie  Falls  and  White  River  Power  plants,  which  supply 
electric  light  and  power  to  Seattle,  Tacoma,  Everett,  and  the 
intervening  towns.  Since  the  completion  of  this  work  he 
with  his  college  mate  and  associate,  Frank  S.  Washburn,  also 
an  engineer,  organized  the  Muscle  Shoals  Hydro-Electric 
Power  Company,  and  the  Alabama  Interstate  Power  Company, 
of  Alabama,  in  each  of  which  companies  he  is  half  owner 
These  companies  have  under  development  about  200,000  H.  P. 
on  the  Tennessee  and  Talapoosa  Rivers  in  Alabama,  which 
will  be  distributed  in  Alabama,  Tennessee  and  Georgia,  and 
constitute  a  project  about  ten  times  larger  than  Snoqualmie. 
With  the  same  associate  he  also  organized  and  controls  and  is 
vice-president  of  the  American  Cyanamid  Company,  own- 
ing the  rights  in  America  for  the  manufacture  and  sale  of 
calcium  cyanamid  or  lime  nitrogen,  the  nitrogen  being  derived 
from  the  atmosphere.  This  will  be  universally  used  as  a 
fertilizer  and  in  the  arts,  for  which  purpose  great  quantities 
of  power  from  the  water  power  plants  will  be  required.  He 
was  married  in  1888  to  Miss  Gertrude  Gladys  France,  of  Rome, 
N.  Y.,  and  they  have  had  four  children,  William  Taylor  Baker, 
named  after  the  subject  of  this  book,  Theodore  Anderson 
Baker,  who  died  at  the  age  of  ten  months,  Leslie  David  France 
Baker,  and  Dorothy  Elizabeth  Baker. 

3.  Howard  Winfield  Baker,  named  in  honor  of  his  father's 
native  town,  West  Winfield,  New  York,  was  born  in  Chicago, 
March  19,  1866.  Contemporaneously  with  his  older  brother 
he  was  educated  at  Cornell  University,  and  was  graduated 


102         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

from  there  at  the  same  time,  the  youngest  in  his  class,  as  a 
civil  engineer.  He  engaged  in  railroad  work  in  Dakota  for 
about  a  year  for  the  Chicago  &  Northwestern  Railroad,  and 
then  went  to  Seattle,  where  for  a  year  he  served  as  engineer 
of  construction  on  the  waterfront  trestle  of  the  Seattle,  Lake 
Shore  &  Eastern  Railroad.  He  then  gave  up  engineering 
and  engaged  in  the  real  estate  business  with  considerable  profit 
to  himself,  and  finally  and  for  about  five  years  he  developed 
a  profitable  business  on  the  harbor  front,  in  the  shipping  of 
merchandise  and  as  agent  for  several  steamship  lines.  The 
panic  of  1893,  together  with  the  collapse  of  his  dock  due  to 
a  storm,  put  him  out  of  business  in  Seattle.  He  then  returned 
to  Chicago,  where  his  older  brother  soon  secured  for  him  a 
position  in  the  employ  of  Butler  Brothers'  wholesale  establish- 
ment, with  which  concern  he  is  still  officially  connected,  hav- 
ing been  promoted  from  a  humble  beginning  to  the  position 
of  assistant  manager  of  the  Chicago  house,  which  he  now 
holds.  He  also  has  a  considerable  financial  interest  in  the  busi- 
ness, secured  through  the  assistance  of  his  father.  Butler 
Brothers  is  the  largest  concern  in  the  United  States,  dealing 
at  wholesale  in  notions,  toys,  dry  goods,  and  general  small 
counter  goods.  They  have  business  houses  in  Chicago,  St. 
Louis,  Minneapolis  and  New  York.  He  has  been  twice 
married  and  twice  a  widower,  having  first  been  married  to 
Mrs.  Josephine  Geiger,  of  Chicago,  and  the  second  time  to 
Mrs.  Josephine  Nevins,  of  New  York. 

4.  Annie  Merriam  Baker,  familiarly  called  by  her  mother 
"Kitty,"  was  born  in  Chicago,  March  29,  1868.  While  still  an 
infant  she  was  attacked  with  scarletine  and  brain  fever,  which 
permanently  impaired  her  mental  faculties,  so  that  she  grew 
up  into  a  woman  perfect  in  her  physical  development  but 
mentally  deficient.  She  is  cared  for  in  a  private  sanitarium 
at  Kalamazoo,  Michigan.  This  child  possessed  all  the  grace, 
beauty  and  charm  of  her  mother,  and  but  for  the  distressful 
incident  of  her  babyhood,  would  have  grown  into  a  woman  of 


ELIZA  ANNIE  DUNSTER  103 

charming  traits  and  talents,  including  the  gift  of  music.  This 
musical  instinct  she  displays  now  even  under  the  cloud  of 
her  mental  derangement.  As  a  girl  she  had  the  physical 
features  and  figure  and  lovely  hair  worthy  of  the  sculptor's 
or  the  painter's  highest  art.  Though  in  years  she  is  now  a 
woman,  yet  she  still  remains  a  child,  happy  and  contented, 
knowing  no  grief  nor  sorrow,  living  within  herself  unmindful 
of  passing  events,  and  not  appreciating  the  changes  which  time 
has  made  in  her  family ; — and  so  she  will  continue  to  do  while 
she  lives. 

5.  Bertha  Cozette  Baker,  so  named  by  her  mother,  who 
as   a  child  gave  the   same  name   to  her   dolls,   was   born   in 
Chicago,  November  14,  1869,  and  was  educated  in  the  public 
schools  and  in  Dearborn  Seminary  in  that  city.     Growing  into 
womanhood   about   the   time   that   her   step-mother   began   to 
fail,  she  naturally  entered  into  the  management  of  her  father's 
household  affairs,  which  she  did  with  grace  and  dignity,  and 
with  the  business  acumen  of  a  trained  matron,  up  to  the  time 
of  his  death  and  the  consequent  dismantelling  of  the  home- 
stead.    Towards  her  step-mother  in   her   failing  mental  and 
physical   health   she   acted   more   than    the   part   of   an   own 
daughter.     She   put  away  her   girlhood   pleasures,    in   order 
that  she  might  with  greater  devotion  perform  the  duty  to  her 
father  as  she  saw  it  in  the  caring  for  his  wife,  and  this  devotion 
has  consecrated  her  in  the  hearts  of  all  who  know  her,  as  a 
person  of  gentleness,  patience,  loyalty,  and  self-sacrifice.     She 
was  married  in  September,  1903,  to  Mr.  Van  Wagenen  Ailing, 
of  Chicago,  who  at  the  time  was  a  mechanical  engineer  con- 
nected with  the  staff  of  Wells  Brothers,  Contractors.     Since 
then  he  has  resigned  and  organized  and  now  heads  the  Ailing 
Construction  Co.,  which  is  engaged  in  general  building  con 
tracting.    They  were  absent  on  her  wedding  trip  at  the  time  of 
her  father's  sudden  death.     They  have  one  child,  a  daughter 
named  Bertha,  after  its  mother. 

6.  Henry   Dunster  Baker  was  born   on  his   Grandfather 


104        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

Dunster's  farm  near  Attleboro,  Massachusetts,  February  26, 
1872.  His  name  was  given  him  by  his  grandfather  at  the 
request  of  his  mother,  who  named  him  in  honor  of  Henry 
Dunster,  the  first  of  the  line  in  this  country.  He  was  the 
favorite  of  the  children  with  his  step-mother,  who  coming 
as  she  did  while  he  was  yet  a  small  child,  had  most  to  do  with 
his  bringing  up.  He  was  educated  at  Yale  College,  where  he 
achieved  distinction  in  his  class  and  where  he  was  graduated 
in  1896,  in  the  literary  branches.  He  entered  journalism  after 
his  graduation,  taking  a  position  as  reporter  for  the  Chicago 
Tribune.  He  did  this  work  with  such  success  that  he  was  in 
time  promoted  in  charge  of  the  editorial  work  of  the  financial 
column  of  that  paper,  succeeding  to  the  position  formerly  held 
by  Mr.  Vanderlip,  now  Vice-President  of  the  National  City 
Bank,  of  New  York.  While  serving  as  reporter  he  is  remem- 
bered as  having  distinguished  himself  by  ingeniously  securing 
for  his  paper  a  number  of  valuable  "scoops."  He  kept  this 
position  for  several  years,  and  then  engaged  in  writing  upon 
financial  topics  for  several  different  papers.  Later  he  moved 
to  Minneapolis  and  became  associate  editor  of  the  Commercial 
West,  one  of  the  leading  financial  and  trade  papers  in  the 
Northwest.  He  finally  withdrew  from  this  paper  and  returned 
to  Chicago,  where  he  still  continues  his  literary  pursuits,  com- 
bining the  same  with  financial  operations,  in  which  he  has 
been  successful.  He  was  married  in  November,  1906,  to  Miss 
Edna  Woolen,  of  Boston,  Massachusetts.  He  has  recently 
been  appointed  consul  at  Hobart,  Tasmania. 

If  our  mother  and  father  have  given  in  fair  meas- 
ure their  attributes  to  their  children, — the  children 
are  indeed  richly  endowed. 

My  mother  was  active  in  church  matters,  and  very 
popular  in  society  where  she  was  always  in  demand 
because  of  her  literary  and  dramatic  ability,  but  her 
devotion  to  her  children  was  the  great  and  con- 


ELIZA  ANNIE  DUNSTER  105 

spicuous  charm  of  her  life  among  those  who  knew 
her  best.  She  was  clever  indeed  in  amateur  theatricals 
and  several  most  creditable  productions  were  held  in 
our  home  for  the  benefit  of  some  of  the  church  organi- 
zations. 

It  was  the  custom  of  the  family  to  spend  every  sum- 
mer upon  Grandfather  Dunster's  farm  in  Massa- 
chusetts. We,  the  children,  looked  forward  to  the 
coming  of  summer,  months  in  advance,  chaffing  at  the 
way  the  school  term  dragged  along,  with  no  desire  to 
close  itself,  and  impatiently  packing  and  unpacking 
our  little  trunks  every  few  days  to  kill  time.  And 
when  we  went  it  was  like  a  circus  moving; — trunks, 
boxes  and  baby  carriages  piled  high  on  vans,  and  a 
carriage  or  two  full  of  children  of  all  ages  and  sexes, 
and  a  Papa  going  along  to  the  depot  to  give  final 
directions  and  to  say  goodbye,  half  sorry  to  have  us 
go  and  yet  half  glad  withal  to  get  free  of  us  for  a 
time.  We  took  stacks  of  cold  lunches,  for  dining  cars 
were  not  then  invented.  Grandpa  adopted  us  every 
year.  We  learned  from  him  how  to  plow  and  culti- 
vate, make  hay,  run  a  lathe  and  make  dovetail  boxes, 
and  to  be  expert  geologists  as  well.  We  helped  to 
manage  the  setting  hens,  and  suckling  calves.  We  fed 
the  pigs  and  churned  the  butter.  We  went  swimming 
and  berrying  and  did  all  those  things  which  made 
Grandpa's  farm  appear  as  we  look  backwards  in  our 
lives  as  the  real  oasis,  where  our  young  characters 
received  a  great  deal  of  their  early  and  best  mould- 
ing. Late  in  the  summer  before  our  vacation  was 


106         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

over,  Father  would  usually  come  to  join  us  for  a  couple 
of  weeks,  and  while  there  he  would  assist  us  in  making 
kites  and  flying  them,  in  which  art  as  a  boy  he  had 
been  an  expert ;  and  he  would  also  work  in  Grandpa's 
shop  and  turn  clever  things  on  the  lathe.  I  went  back 
there  last  summer  and  rambled  around  all  over  as  of 
old,  and  I  could  not  help  but  think;— 

"How  dear  to  my  heart  are  the  scenes  of  my  childhood 
When  fond  recollection  present  them  to  view; 

The  orchard,  the  meadow,  the  dear-tangled  wildwood, 
And  all  the  loved  spots  which  my  infancy  knew." 

From  the  summer  visit  of  1871,  our  mother  had 
just  returned  to  Chicago,  leaving  us  children  to  come 
later  with  our  Aunt  Mary,  when  the  great  Chicago 
fire  broke  out,  so  that  Father  had  her  return  to  Attle- 
boro  again  immediately,  where  we  all  spent  the  fall 
and  winter,  and  where  during  this  time,  the  last  child 
was  born.  The  summer  of  1873  was  as  usual  spent  in 
the  East,  and  during  this  visit  our  mother  renewed 
acquaintance  with  all  the  friends  of  her  early  days, 
and  returned  with  us  all  to  Chicago  about  the  first 
of  September  of  that  year.  Not  long  after  this,  she 
started  from  the  house  one  Saturday  afternoon  to 
go  to  a  matinee,  but  within  an  hour  she  was  brought 
back  upon  a  stretcher  in  an  unconscious  condition  and 
with  a  terrible  gash  across  her  temple.  She  had  taken 
an  omnibus  to  go  down  town,  when  the  horses  becom- 
ing frightened  engaged  in  a  mad  runaway  down 
Wabash  Avenue,  which  resulted  in  her  being  thrown 
on  her  head  against  the  curbstone  of  the  street  while 


ELIZA  ANNIE  DUNSTER  107 

foolishly  attempting  to  get  out  of  the  conveyance. 
The  person  following  behind  in  the  general  panic, 
stepped  on  her  skirt  and  caused  her  to  trip.  At  first 
it  was  thought  that  she  was  not  dangerously  injured, 
but  after  a  few  days  she  again  became  delirious,  in 
which  state  of  mind  she  repeatedly  called  for  her  chil- 
dren and  for  her  husband,  he  being  in  New  York  City 
at  the  time,  and  not  having  been  sent  for  as  her  con- 
dition was  not  at  first  considered  really  serious.  How- 
ever, after  a  week  of  suffering,  she  died  September 
17,  1873,  but  not  before  Father  had  returned  to  her 
and  consciousness  had  been  regained,  so  that  with  the 
knowledge  that  the  end  was  at  hand,  she  was  able  to 
tell  him  and  her  five  little  children  her  last  good  bye. 
For  three  days  while  waiting  the  coming  of  relatives, 
Father  wept  by  her  casket  night  and  day,  and  his  great 
grief  was  shared  by  us  little  children  in  a  dazed  sort 
of  way,  and  we  hardly  appreciated  the  terribleness  of 
the  calamity  which  had  befallen  us.  She  was  then 
only  thirty-five  years  old.  Bishop  Charles  Edward 
Cheney,  her  pastor,  made  an  affectionate  address  at 
the  funeral,  to  which  nearly  all  the  congregation  of 
Christ  Church  attended  at  the  family  residence  on 
Michigan  Avenue.  She  \vas  buried  in  Graceland 
Cemtery,  beside  her  first  baby. 

Mr.  Cheney  in  writing  to  her  father  said: — 
"You  speak  of  gratitude  for  what  I  said  at  your  daughter's 
funeral.  I  assure  it  was  the  sincere  utterance  of  my  heart. 
Mrs.  Baker  was  exceedingly  dear  to  Mrs.  Cheney  and  myself. 
Our  acquaintance  began  when  she  was  in  deep  affliction  (the 
death  of  Willie,  her  first  born),  and  the  ties  thus  formed  grew 


108        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

stronger  every  year.  She  was  universally  beloved  by  all  our 
church  as  well  as  by  a  large  circle  of  friends  outside  its  limits. 
Her  fondness  for  literary  pursuits  and  literary  society  rendered 
her  the  centre  of  attraction  for  a  great  many  who  had  similar 
tastes,  while  her  devotion  to  her  family  and  children  was  her 
chief  charm  to  those  who  knew  her  best. 

Besides  what  I  have  already  alluded  to,  viz.,  her  literary 
culture  and  her  love  for  her  children,  the  most  marked  char- 
acteristics of  Mrs.  Baker's  life  were  her  cheerfulness  under 
all  circumstances,  and  her  unselfish,  gentle,  Christian  spirit. 
These  made  her  beloved  by  rich  and  poor  alike;  and  her 
memory  is  cherished  by  many  who  will  never  forget  her  words 
and  deeds  of  kindness." 

And  so  our  young  mother  was  taken  away,  and 
left  us  five  little  children,  I  being  nine  years  old  and 
the  oldest,  and  the  youngest  only  a  baby.  Her  sister, 
our  Aunt  Mary  Smith,  then  came  and  took  her  place 
for  six  years,  and  no  mother  ever  lived  who  gave  more 
real  love  and  devotion  to  her  own  children  than  did 
Aunt  Mary  to  us.  She  died  in  about  a  year  after 
leaving  us  and  was  buried  beside  her  two  infant  chil- 
dren at  Dover,  New  Hampshire.  I  have  often  won- 
dered, had  our  mother  lived,  if  we  children  would 
have  scattered  around  the  country  as  we  did  when  we 
grew  up. 

On  President  Dunster's  coat  of  arms  designed  by 
himself  appeared  this  Latin  word, — "Veritds,"  mean- 
ing that  that  symbol  would  be  a  guide  star  to  his  daily 
life,  to  the  end  that  he  might  aspire  to  be  an  incarnation 
of  that  exalted  principle.  Over  the  gateway  of  Har- 
vard University  is  also  inscribed  today  this  same 


ELIZA  ANNIE  DUNSTER 


109 


"Veritas,"  handed  down  from  him.  And  it  came  even 
further  and  to  my  mother  whose  whole  life  exempli- 
fied the  truth. 


1890-1897 

CHICAGO,  by  virtue  of  her  geographical  loca- 
tion naturally  in  her  early  history  became  the 
grain  centre  of  the  United  States.  The  great 
grain  producing  areas  of  the  country  extended 
hundreds  of  miles  out  from  her  borders  and 
three-fourths  around  her  horizon.  She  was  situ- 
ated at  the  head  of  navigation  on  the  Great 
Lakes  and  was  in  the  line  of  railroad  develop- 
ment. It  was  only  logical  that  grain  and  trans- 
portation converging  at  that  point,  should  result  in 
a  trade  mart  springing  up  there.  As  the  outlying 
agricultural  districts  were  put  under  cultivation  more 
and  more,  it  came  about  that  a  small  colony  of  grain 
merchants  and  traders  developed  and  became  an  im- 
portant feature  of  the  business  community.  They  had 
no  particular  organization.  The  farmers  came  in 
from  the  fields  and  sold  their  produce  to  commission 
merchants  or  warehousemen,  or  some  times  these  mer- 
chants went  out  and  met  the  farmer  upon  his  own 
premises,  viewed  the  grain  growing  in  his  fields  or 
stored  in  his  grannery,  and  purchased  it  from  him 
there.  The  merchant  in  turn  would  make  up  carloads 
of  grain  and  ship  them  to  the  millers,  and  to  seaboard 
points  upon  the  Atlantic,  and  in  later  years  to  foreign 


112         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

countries.  As  a  matter  of  convenience  to  both  mer- 
chant and  farmer,  it  became  necessary  for  the  trading 
to  be  done  in  a  particular  place,  rather  than  wherever 
the  farmer  would  find  his  merchant  or  the  merchant 
find  his  farmer,  and  so  there  developed  in  1848  a  vol- 
untary organization  on  South  Water  Street,  which 
went  by  the  name  of  the  Board  of  Trade.  This  or- 
ganization a  year  later,  was  incorporated  under  the 
general  incorporation  laws  of  the  State  with  Thomas 
Dyer  as  its  first  President,  and  so  continued  until 
1859,  when  it  was  reorganized  under  a  special  charter 
given  by  the  State  of  Illinois.  The  declared  objects  of 
the  organization  were: — "To  maintain  a  commercial 
exchange;  to  promote  uniformity  in  the  customs  and 
objects  of  merchants ;  to  inculcate  principles  of  justice 
and  honesty  in  trade;  to  facilitate  the  speedy  adjust- 
ment of  business  disputes ;  to  acquire  and  disseminate 
valuable  commercial  and  economic  information;  and 
generally,  to  secure  to  its  members  the  benefits  of  co- 
operation in  the  furtherance  of  their  legitimate  pur- 
suits." With  a  foundation  resting  upon  this  declara- 
tion of  principles  and  purposes,  and  dwelling  in  the 
midst  of  a  natural  situation  which  of  necessity  gave 
birth  to  it,  the  Chicago  Board  of  Trade  grew  from 
its  primitive  beginning  until  it  became,  in  fact,  the 
greatest  organization  of  its  kind  in  the  world,  and  as 
such  it  has  exercised  a  widespread  influence  and 
power.  Other  similar  organizations,  although  of 
smaller  stature,  developed  in  other  parts  of  the  coun- 
try, and  each  of  the  others  has  served  its  useful  pur- 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  113 

pose  and  exercised  its  own  particular  sphere  of  in- 
fluence. 

In  1853  the  Board  moved  its  quarters  to  No.  8 
Dearborn  Street,  at  which  time  the  interest  taken  in 
the  Board  was  so  small  that  the  Secretary  was  ordered 
to  provide  refreshments  for  the  members  in  order  to 
induce  them  to  attend.  A  reading  room  was  also  in- 
stalled for  the  same  purpose.  The  Board  moved 
again  in  1856  to  the  corner  of  South  Water  and  La 
Salle  Streets,  and  two  years  later  for  the  first  time 
in  its  history  it  began  to  receive  daily  reports  of 
market  conditions  from  outside  points  like  New  York, 
Montreal  and  Buffalo.  The  Board  was  not  on  a 
stable  or  paying  basis  until  1857.  During  the  early 
part  of  its  existence  it  took  a  leading  part  in  all  affairs 
touching  the  City  of  Chicago  and  the  extension  of  its 
trade.  It  donated  $10,000  to  the  support  of  the  Civil 
War  in  April,  1861,  and  made  many  other  similar 
donations  before  the  war  closed.  In  this  year  which 
was  the  year  my  father  came  to  town,  its  membership 
was  only  725.  In  1864  it  again  moved  and  this  time 
to  the  Chamber  of  Commerce  Building  where  it  re- 
mained until  the  great  fire.  Its  present  building  was 
completed  in  1885  at  a  cost  of  $1,800,000.  Prior  to 
1858  the  chief  measure  which  it  had  inaugurated  and 
was  responsible  for,  was  the  substitution  of  weights 
instead  of  measures  in  measuring  grains,  seeds  and 
other  commodities,  and  later  the  designation  of  wheat 
by  standard  grades,  which  has  since  become  the  sys- 
tem in  universal  use. 


114         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

Following  the  success  of  the  Chicago  Board  of 
Trade  and  others  like  it,  there  came  into  being  the 
National  Board  of  Trade,  being  a  combination  of  all 
American  Boards  of  Trade,  having  for  its  purpose 
the  bringing  of  the  igredient  members  into  closer  re- 
lationship with  each  other  for  the  establishment  of  a 
community  of  interests  and  for  the  betterment  and 
furtherance  of  their  individual  purposes  and  their 
purposes  as  a  whole.  The  National  Board  of  Trade 
has  its  headquarters  in  Philadelphia,  and  meets  in 
convention  once  a  year,  generally  in  Washington, 
D.  C.,  and  often  in  other  important  cities.  In  the  evo- 
lution of  trade  as  it  may  proceed  from  now  on  and  into 
the  future,  it  might  be  reasonable  to  expect  that  an 
International  Board  of  Trade  may  result,  for  the  pur- 
pose of  bringing  into  closer  relation  the  trade  organi- 
zations of  Europe  and  other  countries,  with  those  of 
America.  The  railroads,  the  telegraphs,  and  the  sub- 
marine cables  are  apparently  making  the  world  grow 
smaller  and  smaller  as  time  goes  on,  and  business  in- 
terests are  thereby  brought  into  closer  and  closer  re- 
lationship, and  an  International  Board  of  Trade  may 
be  the  final  result  of  it. 

The  parts  which  Boards  of  Trade  play  in  our  mod- 
ern civilization  are  impressive.  They  bring  into  corre- 
lation the  resources  of  the  mind  and  field  with  the 
power  of  human  thought  and  activity.  They  give  rise 
to  the  simplifying  of  business  methods,  and  to  reduc- 
ing expenses  incidental  to  the  distribution  of  mer- 
chandise, and  to  the  minimizing  of  risks.  They  are 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  115 

able  to  mirror  the  trade  situation  not  only  as  to  its 
local  aspects,  but  to  worldwide  conditions  and  in- 
fluences. They  stimulate  and  sustain  industry  and 
commercial  conditions,  and  so  help  lay  the  foundation 
stones  of  prosperity  by  creating  regulated  and  equit- 
able competition  among  merchants,  not  only  in  re- 
stricted areas,  but  in  worldwide  spheres. 

It  was  either  men  or  conditions,  or  a  combination 
of  both,  which  eventually  caused  the  Chicago  Board 
of  Trade  to  tower  and  loom  high  in  the  ranks  of  simi- 
lar organizations,  until  in  prestige  and  in  dignity,  in 
power  and  influence,  and  in  volume  of  business,  it 
stood  without  a  peer.  Then  came  a  blight  upon  it 
like  a  festering  sore,  the  bucket-shops,  which  from  an 
insignificant  beginning,  at  first  hardly  noticed,  grew 
to  such  a  degree  that  it  threatened  the  very  underpin- 
ning of  the  Board  of  Trade  itself.  The  bucket-shop 
idea,  was  to  trade  upon  the  Board  of  Trade  quota- 
tions; to  extend  to  its  patrons  the  privilege  of  gam- 
bling upon  or  guessing  what  the  Board  of  Trade 
quotations  in  a  given  commodity  would  be  from  one 
moment  to  another,  and  charging  a  small  stipend  or 
bet  to  the  person  who  wished  to  indulge  in  the  gam- 
bling or  guessing.  The  development  of  this  business 
attracted  by  its  allurements  a  large  number  of  people 
of  small  means,  who  would  make  bets  in  varying 
amounts  from  $10  up.  This  system  grew  as  parasites 
grow,  thriving  upon  the  more  wholesome  thing  upon 
which  it  fastens  itself.  It  well  and  consistently  took 
its  name  "Bucket-shop"  from  a  degraded  order  of 


116         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

scavengers  in  England,  whose  avocation  was  to  go 
around  from  place  to  place  and  drain  the  dregs  from 
empty  and  abandoned  beer  and  wine  casks  into 
buckets,  until  a  sufficient  quantity  had  been  gathered 
to  make  it  the  subject  of  barter,  when  it  would  be  sold 
to  a  place  called  a  bucket  shop,  and  where  in  turn  the 
dregs  would  be  bought  by  people  who  were  willing  to 
accept  such  a  low  standard  of  goods.  The  bucket-shop 
evil  was  contended  with  by  the  Board  of  Trade  organ- 
ization in  a  desultory  way  as  time  went  on,  permitting 
the  incubus  to  grow  to  its  full  strength  until  it  reached 
a  point  where  a  definite  and  determined  fight  would 
have  to  be  made  against  it  to  preserve  the  existence  of 
the  Board  of  Trade  itself. 

At  this  point  in  the  history  of  the  Board  of  Trade 
my  father  begins  to  loom  conspicuously.  The  mem- 
bers of  the  Board  with  one  accord,  looked  to  him  as 
the  man  of  the  hour,  and  as  their  Moses  to  lead  them 
through  this  sea  of  trouble  and  to  destroy  their  com- 
mon enemy.  With  bucket-shops  as  an  issue  therefore 
and  with  my  father  as  the  champion  of  the  proposed 
crusade,  the  election  of  January,  1890,  found  him  at 
the  age  of  forty-nine  beginning  his  first  term  as  Presi- 
dent of  the  Board  of  Trade,  and  then  and  there  the 
fight  began.  I  have  heard  him  spoken  of  figuratively 
in  this  connection  later  as  having  been  to  the  Board 
of  Trade  what  President  Roosevelt  is  to  the  United 
States.  The  net  .result  of  choosing  this  "Teddy"  for 
captain,  and  turning  him  loose  like  a  bulldog  upon  the 
situation,  was  for  the  first  time  in  the  history  of  the 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  117 

Board  to  route  the  bucket-shop  industry.  To  accom- 
plish this,  heroic  measures  had  to  be  resorted  to,  but 
Father  employed  them  without  hesitation.  The  pow- 
erful telegraph  companies,  which  for  years  had  en- 
joyed the  undisturbed  privilege  of  sending  continuous 
quotations  from  the  floor  of  the  Board  were  peremp- 
torily ordered  off  the  floor.  It  was  found  that  promi- 
nent brokers  on  the  Exchange  were  in  collusion  with 
bucket-shopmen  on  the  outside,  and  these  were  sternly 
disciplined,  and  such  other  action  was  taken  from 
time  to  time  as  was  necessary  to  cut  off  all  communi- 
cation with  the  Board  through  which  the  bucket-shops 
received  their  quotations,  and  they  were  thus  unable 
to  do  business  in  the  same  old  way.  One  by  one  these 
parasites  on  the  Board  were  killed  off,  and  their  illegal 
business  stamped  out  in  large  installments.  As  the 
plague  grew  less  in  Chicago,  however,  it  took  root 
and  began  to  thrive  in  other  cities,  so  that  the  fight 
had  to  be  carried  on  outside  of  the  limits  of  the  State 
of  Illinois. 

My  Father's  first  administration  as  President  of 
the  Board  covered  the  most  prosperous  year  in  its 
history,  which  condition  was  due  not  only  to  the  gen- 
eral prosperity  throughout  the  country,  but  to  the 
making  of  such  great  strides  in  disinfecting  the  busi- 
ness from  the  bucket-shop  iniquity.  There  were  1913 
enrolled  members  of  the  Board  in  this  year,  which 
at  the  time  was  the  high  water  mark  in  its  member- 
ship. Chicago  as  a  city  had  risen  to  a  population  of 
nearly  a  million  and  a  quarter,  with  over  85,000  miles 


118         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

of  railroad  track  tributary  to  it,  as  against  4,500  miles 
in  1 86 1,  the  year  of  Father's  first  coming  to  Chicago. 
The  prosperity  of  the  Board  of  Trade  as  an  organi- 
zation, which  the  general  prosperity  and  measures  of 
reform  had  given  it,  placed  the  organization  in  such 
financial  shape  that  it  began  the  retirement  of  its 
bonds  which  had  been  previously  issued  for  the  pur- 
pose of  erecting  the  fine  structure  which  has  ever 
since  been  the  home  of  the  Exchange.  $50,000  of 
the  bonds  were  thus  retired  during  this  administra- 
tion, and  this  set  the  pace  for  additional  retirements  in 
equal  amounts  during  the  following  years. 

In  addition  to  its  being  the  principal  grain  ex- 
change in  the  world,  the  Board  of  Trade  exercises  a 
potent  influence  as  one  of  the  most  important  organi- 
zations in  the  country.  In  this  year  it  exerted  its 
tremendous  influence  with  its  endorsement  of  the  In- 
terstate Commerce  Law,  which  soon  became  of  very 
great  benefit  to  the  people  through  the  medium  of 
the  Interstate  Commerce  Commission  which  that  law 
created.  The  Board  also  took  a  strong  stand  on  the 
currency  situation  of  the  country,  and  against  the 
silver  agitation,  which  was  then  being  promulgated 
about  the  country.  It  was  in  connection  with  this  agi- 
tation that  my  father  wrote  an  able  paper  upon  the 
currency  question  which  was  published  in  pamphlet 
form  and  widely  distributed,  and  this  paper,  together 
with  his  several  inaugural  addresses  touching  upon 
the  important  issues  of  the  nation,  the  city  and  the 
Board  of  Trade,  are  frequently  even  at  this  late  day 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  119 

and  long  after  his  demise,  brought  forth  as  platform 
principles  at  the  different  Board  of  Trade  elections. 
The  Board  therefore,  became  very  influential  in  the 
nation,  and  deference  was  paid  to  the  stand  which  it 
took  upon  all  issues,  for  which  issues,  my  father  was 
generally  responsible.  The  Board  also  in  this  year 
did  effective  work  in  securing  the  deepening  of  the 
Chicago  River,  and  by  a  general  petition  it  addressed 
the  Congress  of  the  United  States  for  the  improve- 
ment of  the  Mississippi  River.  It  also  did  much  to 
establish  reciprocity  in  the  trade  relations  between  this 
country  and  South  America,  and  to  bring  into  nearer 
commercial  relations  the  people  of  all  the  countries  of 
the  two  Americas. 

Another  incubus  which  fastened  itself  upon  the 
Board  of  Trade  and  against  which  Father  directed 
his  attention  during  his  first  administration  was  the 
elevator  monopoly.  The  elevator  men  as  public  ware- 
housemen and  as  the  custodians  of  grain  belonging  to 
different  merchants  occupied  a  position  of  high  trust, 
which  they  took  advantage  of  to  the  detriment  of  their 
patrons.  Unjust  discrimination  and  classification  in 
grain  began  to  be  practiced,  and  the  elevators,  besides 
being  the  depository  of  grain  for  others,  entered  the 
trade  for  themselves  and  owned  and  housed  grain  of 
their  own,  contrary  to  the  established  principle  of 
the  relation  between  warehousemen  and  merchants. 
Father,  therefore,  opened  fire  upon  the  elevators  with 
the  same  ardor  that  he  did  upon  the  bucket-shops, 
under  the  contention  that  elevators  could  not  buy,  sell, 


120         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

clean,  mix,  receive  or  ship  grain,  except  for  others 
than  themselves.  To  get  at  the  root  of  the  trouble, 
the  drastic  measure  was  inaugurated  of  excluding  ele- 
vator men  from  membership  on  the  Board.  The  ques- 
tion finally  became  one  of  judicial  determination  and 
Judge  Tuley  accordingly  decided  against  the  ele- 
vators, and  confined  them  to  the  performance  of  their 
duties  as  public  custodians  of  grain  and  against  their 
position  as  traders  in  the  commodity.  It  seems  that 
Father's  fire  was  directed  more  particularly  against 
the  Armour  elevator  interests,  undoubtedly  for  the 
reason  that  these  interests  were  more  justly  the  sub- 
ject of  criticism  and  condemnation.  These  interests 
went  so  far  as  issuing  illegal  warehouse  receipts  upon 
property  which  did  not  really  exist,  but  was  supposed 
to  be  stored  within  their  elevators.  Warehouse  re- 
ceipts for  wheat  are  bankable  collateral,  as  they  repre- 
sent property  as  good  as  gold,  so  that  if  they  can  be 
turned  out  fradulently  and  without  property  behind 
them,  they  make  bank  accommodations  possible  to  the 
elevator  owner  who  is  hard  up,  which  would  not  be 
possible  if  the  actual  possession  of  property  were 
necessary.  My  father  kept  hot  on  the  trail  of  P.  D. 
Armour  until  he  lost  the  scent,  and  it  is  said  that  Mr. 
Armour  was  more  afraid  of  him  than  any  other  man. 
It  was  natural  as  a  result  of  my  father's  warlike 
attitude,  that  the  displeasure  and  hostility  of  the  united 
elevator  interests  should  be  invoked  against  him,  so 
that  whenever  the  Board  of  Trade  members  wished 
him  to  head  the  administration  ticket  at  any  election, 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  121 

it  was  a  natural  result  that  the  opposition  ticket  if  any, 
should  be  the  one  known  as  the  "Elevator  Ticket."  At 
the  end  of  his  first  administration,  which  had  been  re- 
sponsible for  such  genuine  and  far-reaching  reforms, 
it  was  only  logical  and  inevitable  that  he  should  be 
asked  to  run  again  for  the  office;  which  he  did,  with 
the  result  that  he  was  again  elected  in  January,  1891. 
His  second  year  was  not  as  conspicuous  for  new  re- 
forms as  it  was  for  the  continued  and  unremitting 
prosecution  of  the  reforms  already  begun.  The  war- 
fare on  the  bucket-shops  was  continued  and  new 
methods  were  adopted  from  time  to  time  to  outflank 
them. 

Among  other  things  done  in  this  connection,  was 
securing  official  declaration  from  the  United  States 
Post  Office  Department  that  all  mail  matter  coming 
from  and  directed  to  bucket-shops  was  illegal  mail 
matter,  so  that  bucket-shops  were  consequently  de- 
prived of  the  privilege  of  the  mail  service.  In  this 
year  the  telegraph  instruments  were  installed  again 
on  the  floor  of  the  Exchange,  under  proper  restric- 
tions as  to  their  use.  The  rules  of  the  Board,  many  of 
which  had  grown  into  disuse,  were  revived  and  were 
rigidly  enforced.  As  the  President  of  the  Exchange, 
my  father  was  as  rigid  a  disciplinarian  as  he  would  have 
been  had  he  been  running  a  military  school.  He  ap- 
plied the  lash  to  big  and  little  alike.  He  enforced 
rigidly  the  rule  that  there  should  be  no  trading  after 
the  closing  hour  of  the  Exchange,  and  he  opposed 
most  strenuously  the  illegal  practice  of  puts  and  calls, 


122         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

and  for  this  reason  he  became  unpopular  with  the 
scalpers. 

At  the  close  of  1891,  his  second  term,  and  as  the 
result  of  there  having  been  so  strong  a  man  at  the 
helm,  the  skies  had  cleared  about  the  Board  of  Trade 
horizon.  He  felt  that  he  had  done  his  duty  to  his  fel- 
low members,  and  that  there  was  no  further  need  of 
his  accepting  the  office  again,  and  he  did  not  therefore, 
allow  the  presentation  of  his  name,  and  so  was  able  to 
give  his  time  to  the  World's  Fair  matters,  which  were 
then  beginning  to  absorb  his  attention. 

Some  one  had  truly  said: 

"When  the  cat's  away 
The  mice  will  play." 

and  such  proved  to  be  the  case  in  the  next  three  years 
of  the  Board  of  Trade  history  during  my  father's 
retirement.  The  bucket-shops  seemed  to  take  on  life 
again  and  the  trade  was  threatened  again  with  this 
old  time  spectre  in  formidable  proportions,  and  the 
elevator  men  also  had  grown  bold  and  sought  to  domi- 
nate the  Board  of  Trade.  As  the  result  of  these  re- 
turning conditions,  the  logical  candidate  for  President 
—my  father — was  again  put  forward,  and  for  the 
third  time  he  was  elected  to  the  office  to  serve  during 
the  year  1895.  This  was  a  bad  year  in  the  commercial 
world  as  the  great  panic  of  1893  had  not  entirely  dis- 
appeared. Prosperity  had  not  yet  again  begun  to 
declare  itself.  The  currency  situation  in  the  country 
was  uncertain,  and  therefore  unsettled  all  business 
conditions.  The  price  of  corn  was  the  lowest  in  the 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  123 

history  of  the  country  since  1880,  as  also  was  the  price 
of  wheat,  and  when  these  two  mainstays  get  down  to 
such  low  levels,  one  need  look  for  no  further  sign  of 
distressful  conditions.  Crops  were  all  larger  than 
usual  but  prices  lower.  A  farmer's  wife  could  sell 
a  dozen  of  eggs  for  almost  as  much  as  he  could  get 
for  a  bushel  of  wheat,  for  wheat  had  gotten  down  to 
the  low  level  of  25  cents  a  bushel.  The  conditions  at 
home  and  abroad  which  Father  had  to  face  upon 
entering  his  third  term  as  President,  and  the  purposes 
of  his  coming  administration  as  the  corrective  of  bad 
conditions,  are  well  set  forth  in  his  inaugural  address 
of  that  year,  which  I  can  do  no  better  than  to  embody 
herein,  not  only  for  the  subject  matter  therein  con- 
tained, but  also  to  display  as  a  feature  of  this  bio- 
graphy, the  forcefulness  of  his  manner  of  expression, 
and  the  terseness  and  pure  style  of  his  diction.  As 
far  as  they  go,  his  addresses  serve  as  his  own  auto- 
biography. 

"In  accepting  for  a  third  term  the  office  to  which  you  have 
elected  me,  I  thank  you  for  the  expression  of  your  continued 
confidence,  while  I  shrink  from  the  responsibilities  involved. 
I  can  only  hope  that  at  the  end  of  my  term  you  will  let  a 
record  of  good  intentions  palliate  whatever  failure  there  may 
be  on  my  part  to  satisfy  your  expectations." 

"This  Board  of  Trade  has  always  been  a  leading  and  influ- 
ential factor  in  the  commerce  of  the  country.  Its  prosperity 
and  continued  ascendency  are  essential  to  the  progress  of 
this  city  and  the  expansion  of  the  trade  of  the  great  North- 
west. As  we  bear  our  share  of  the  burdens  and  disasters  that 
befall  the  country,  we  may  also  claim  our  right  to  participate 
in  the  general  prosperity  when  fortune  smiles  again.  If  there 


124        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

is  any  inherent  reason  why  we  may  not  so  participate,  let  us 
find  it  out  and  remove  the  cause." 

"The  silver  panic  of  1893  prostrated  every  branch  of  business 
and  paralyzed  all  enterprises.  But  the  business  of  this  Board 
has  also  suffered  from  evils  distinctly  local  and  that  do  not 
operate  elsewhere.  Bucket-shop  dealing  has  so  honeycombed 
the  trade  as  to  seem  irradicable,  though  this  association  is 
furnishing  to  bucket-shops  that  without  which  they  never  could 
have  started  and  without  which  they  cannot  exist.  The  capital 
in  trade  of  bucket-shops  is  official  continuous  quotations  which 
you  only  can  supply.  Business  would  go  on  in  your  exchange 
if  no  quotations  ever  left  the  floor,  but  no  bucket-shop  can 
run  an  instant  without  your  quotations.  To  be  of  value  enough 
to  bucket-shops  to  attract  victims,  the  quotations  must  be  not 
only  continuous  but  official.  However  simple-minded  a  man 
must  be  who  ventures  in  a  bucket-shop,  he  will  not  long  trust 
himself  to  the  tender  mercies  of  swindlers  who  could  and 
would  make  figures  to  suit  themselves  in  robbing  their  patrons. 
The  various  gambling  devices  in  pool  rooms  or  elsewhere  in 
this  city  should  not  be  confounded  with  bucket-shop  uses  of 
your  quotations.  While  you  permit  additional  attraction  to  the 
habitues  of  gambling  resorts  which  add  nothing  to  your  credit, 
the  greatest  wrong  is  done  throughout  the  country  where 
patrons  fail  to  distinguish  between  the  bucket-shop  thieves 
and  honorable  business  establishments.  The  city  gambler  sees 
only  a  wager  and  may  be  as  willing  to  bet  on  your  quotations 
as  on  anything  else  that  has  an  uncertain  future.  The  cus- 
tomers of  country  bucket-shops,  on  the  other  hand,  believe 
their  transactions  are  legitimate  and  are  made  on  the  Chicago 
Board  of  Trade.  This  Board  once  tried  the  experiment  of 
discontinuing  supplies  to  bucket-shops.  Was  your  business 
better  while  that  experiment  was  operating,  or  since  it  has 
been  discontinued?  I  ask  you  for  an  expression  on  this  sub- 
ject at  this  meeting,  and  recommend  that  your  Directors  be 
authorized  to  discontinue  the  present  plan  of  supplying  con- 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  125 

tinuous  official  quotations  of  our  markets.  I  am  aware  of 
the  possible  embarrassment  of  again  making  this  arrangement 
acceptable,  owing  to  the  unequal  use  of  private  telegraph  wires 
by  members,  but  think  I  may  pledge  the  Directory  that  the  dis- 
cretion, if  given  them,  will  not  be  used  to  your  disadvantage." 
"Next  to  the  incubus  of  the  bucket-shops  is  the  tyranny  of 
the  elevator  monopoly,  which,  from  a  fair  and  legitimate 
beginning,  has  grown  to  such  proportions  within  your  Associ- 
ation as  to  threaten  its  very  existence.  And  it  is  a  broader 
question  than  the  survival  of  the  fittest  among  groups  of 
business  men  and  interests  in  this  Exchange.  It  concerns  every 
merchant  and  common  carrier  engaged  in  the  great  commerce 
of  this  city,  and  every  farmer  who  contributes  to  make  that 
commerce  possible.  The  warehousing  of  grain  is  only  an  inci- 
dent in  its  transit  from  producer  to  consumer.  Its  natural 
and  healthy  function  is  in  accepting  on  storage  the  overflow 
of  the  season  of  freest  movements  that  the  channels  of  com- 
merce may  not  be  clogged  or  obstructed,  and  safely  caring 
for  the  same  while  waiting  a  demand.  But  in  Chicago  the 
accumulation  and  storage  of  grain  has  come  to  be  the  chief 
end  and  aim  of  potential  and  dominating  forces.  The  alliance 
between  railroads  and  elevators  has  resulted  in  reaching  out 
after  millions  of  bushels  not  naturally  tributary  to  us,  and 
when  gathered  here  preventing  it  by  such  tricks  of  trade  as 
you  are  familiar  with  from  ever  getting  away  again  as  long  as 
storage  can  be  collected  on  it.  This  policy  has  resulted  in 
such  congestion  of  grain  here  as  to  depress  prices  to  the  lowest 
point  in  history.  For  it  is  not  the  Chicago  stock  alone  that 
this  market  has  to  carry.  Its  very  volume  invites  dealers 
in  every  market  in  the  world  to  make  sales  here  against  hold- 
ings elsewhere,  which  they  would  not  dare  to  do  but  for 
abnormal  accumulations  brought  and  held  here  by  unnatural 
means.  Cargoes  of  wheat  bought  on  European  account  in 
Australia,  India,  Russia  and  Argentina,  as  well  as  stocks  at 
all  other  points  of  accumulation,  are  sold  against  here,  so  that 


126         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

our  market  feels  the  weight  of  the  entire  world's  surplus. 
This  condition  is  only  made  possible  by  the  enormous  and 
unnatural  hoard  brought  and  retained  here  to  satisfy  the 
avarice  of  half  a  dozen  corporations  the  largest  of  which  is 
owned  in  London." 

"A  system  that  permits  the  proprietors  of  public 
elevators,  directly  or  indirectly,  to  deal  in  the  property 
of  which  they  are  custodians  is  essentially  immoral.  The 
temptation  to  reserve  for  themselves  the  best  of  a  grade  is 
one  to  which  the  law  never  contemplated  that  they  should  be 
subjected.  Indeed,  the  principal  motive  of  the  warehouse 
law  was  to  prevent  their  ownership  or  control  of  grain  in 
public  warehouses.  Yet  it  is  notorious  that  during  the  past 
year  the  proprietors  of  elevators  have  had  for  sale  and  have 
sold  millions  of  bushels  of  grain  at  a  large  premium,  not  one 
cent  of  which  in  equity  belonged  to  them.  The  grain  bought 
elsewhere  by  elevator  proprietors  is  promptly  sold  here  to 
you  for  some  future  delivery,  so  they  become  the  custodians 
of  your  property,  which,  however,  you  can  only  get  on  pay- 
ment of  such  premiums  as  the  urgency  of  the  demand  may 
enable  them  to  exact.  It  is  an  unwelcome  task  for  me  to 
criticise  the  methods  of  any  class  of  our  members,  but  this  is 
an  occasion  for  plain  speech  and  honest,  earnest  efforts  to 
restore  to  this  Association  its  vanishing  glory  and  traditions." 

"The  elevator  monopoly  is  the  same  blight  on  legitimate 
business  that  anti-option  legislation  would  have  been  if  enacted. 
The  old-time  open  competition  of  thousands  has  been  super- 
seded by  new  conditions  under  which  each  railroad  terminat- 
ing in  Chicago  is  practically  controlled  by  a  single  buyer. 
Special  rates  are  made  to  favored  individuals  who  have  the 
further  advantage  of  elevator  control,  so  that  rates  charged 
to  the  public  are  rebated  to  themselves,  thus  enabling  them  to 
outbid  or  undersell  all  competitors.  This  charge  of  three- 
quarters  of  a  cent  per  bushel  for  the  first  term  of  storage 
is  retained  only  as  a  protection  to  elevator  managers  against 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  127 

the  competition  of  legitimate  dealers  in  grain.  It  is  a  charge 
that  you  cannot  avoid,  but  which  is  ignored  by  them  in  their 
own  transactions,  thus  forcing  every  one  to  sell  to  or  buy  of 
them.  The  fact  that  this  charge  is  not  bona-fide,  but  only  a 
foil  to  competition,  proves  that  it  is  unjust  and  should  be 
abolished.  While  elevator  proprietors  are  willing  to  pay  one 
cent  per  bushel  more  for  grain  'to  go  to  store'  in  their  own 
warehouses  than  the  market  price  of  the  same  grain  in  store 
(and  subject  to  the  charge  of  three-quarters  of  a  cent  per 
bushel),  is  conclusive  that  the  first  storage  charge  is  not  legiti- 
mate, and  also  that  the  subsequent  terms  of  storage  are  unduly 
profitable.  The  charge  for  the  transfer  of  grain  from  cars 
to  vessels,  a  distance  of  perhaps  100  feet,  is  greater  than  the 
average  rate  of  freight,  during  the  past  season,  from  Chicago 
to  Buffalo.  The  same  grain  is  transferred  on  track  by  the 
railroads  themselves  from  western  to  eastern  cars  for  nothing." 
"A  proper  solution  of  our  difficulties  must  include  facilities 
by  railroads  entering  here  for  free  warehousing  of  grain  on 
arrival,  and  fair  rates  for  storage  on  naturally  acquired  accu- 
mulations. The  device  of  collecting  storage  in  advance  of 
delivery  of  grain  has  supplied  largely  increased  capital  to 
elevator  proprietors  to  be  used  against  you  in  the  unequal 
competition  for  business.  There  is  no  legal  or  moral  right 
in  this  practice,  and  it  should  be  terminated  altogether.  Ware- 
house receipts  for  grain  are  made  current  by  your  rules. 
These  rules  are  absolutely  binding  on  every  buyer  in  your 
market  whether  he  is  a  member  of  your  Board  or  not.  It 
therefore  behooves  you  to  protect  the  innocent  purchaser  by 
every  safeguard  within  your  power.  It  is  not  only  your  right 
but  your  imperative  duty  to  have  such  an  oversight  of  elevator 
management  as  will  assure  to  holders  of  warehouse  receipts 
made  regular  by  your  rules  that  their  receipts  represent  not 
only  property,  but  uncontaminated  grades  and  condition.  In 
providing  the  requisites  for  regular  receipts,  it  may  be  pos- 
sible to  correct  some  of  the  abuses  complained  of,  as  well  as 


128        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

give  adequate  security  to  holders  of  warehouse  receipts.  But 
the  Legislature  must  be  appealed  to  to  so  amend  the  ware- 
house law  as  to  make  it  impossible  for  public  warehousemen  to 
be  also  dealers  in  grain ;  and  railroad  companies  having  termi- 
nals here  should  be  required  to  warehouse  their  grain  on 
arrival  as  they  do  every  other  species  of  merchandise.  With 
this  purpose  in  view,  I  recommend  the  appointment  of  a  com- 
mittee on  legislation  outside  the  Board  of  Directors  to  promote 
the  necessary  legislation  at  Springfield." 

"The  uniformity  and  integrity  of  the  inspection  of  grain 
is  of  paramount  importance  to  the  members  of  this  Association. 
It  has  been  placed  by  the  State  entirely  beyond  our  control, 
and  so  long  as  it  is  fairly  conducted  we  would  not  have  it 
otherwise.  Thus  far  there  has  been  little  to  complain  of,  but 
there  is  and  always  will  be  danger  of  politics  dominating  the 
department  to  the  detriment  and  demoralization  of  the  service. 
I  therefore  earnestly  recommend  that  you  direct  your  efforts 
toward  such  a  modification  of  the  law  as  will  place  the  depart- 
ment under  Civil  Service  Reform  rules.  There  should  be  no 
appointments  except  for  merit  and  no  removal  except  for 
cause.  There  can  be  no  question  of  the  necessity  and  justice 
of  this  proposition.  An  inspector  of  grain  in  fixing  its  grade 
thereby  determines  its  value,  a  trust  that  should  not  be  confided 
to  men  who  are  not  skilled  in  their  calling." 

"Zeal  in  partisan  campaign  work  does  not  qutlify  men  for 
this  occupation,  and  none  should  ever  be  employed  who  can- 
not pass  such  an  examination  as  only  a  ripe  experience  will 
prepare  them  for." 

"Trading  in  privileges  has  become  so  common  outside  of 
Exchange  hours  as  to  impair  the  good  name  of  the  Associ- 
ation. These  transactions  are  outside  the  law  and  are  dis- 
tinctly obnoxious  to  your  own  rules.  They  cannot  be  enforced 
either  in  the  courts  or  under  the  rules  of  this  Board,  and 
anyone  can  sue  at  any  time  and  recover  for  even  consequential 
losses.  The  Illinois  statute  prescribes  penalties  of  fine  and 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  129 

imprisonment  for  making  such  contracts,  and  specifically 
declares  that  all  such  contracts  'shall  be  considered  gambling 
contracts  and  shall  be  void.'  It  is  claimed  that  the  dull  state 
of  trade  makes  these  transactions  necessary,  but  do  they  not 
contribute  to  an  important  extent  to  the  very  stagnation  you 
complain  of?  By  coopering  prices  within  a  narrow  limit 
day  after  day,  do  you  not  discourage  business  that  you  would 
count  on  in  a  free  and  unrestricted  market  ?  The  risks  assumed 
by  you  as  commission  merchants  are  beyond  computation,  and 
more  than  all  else  in  making  these  transactions  we  violate  the 
law.  I  sincerely  urge  that  means  may  be  taken  to  put  an 
end  to  the  practice  at  once." 

"No  reputable  citizen  requires  to  be  admonished  to  obey 
the  laws  made  necessary  for  the  well  being  and  order  of  the 
community,  but  there  is  a  more  immediate  and  direct  obli- 
gation upon  members  of  this  Board  to  fidelity  to  its  rules,  for 
every  member  has  signed  his  name  to  a  solemn  compact  in 
these  words:  'We,  the  undersigned,  members  of  the  Board  of 
Trade  of  the  City  of  Chicago,  do,  by  our  respective  signatures 
and  by  virtue  of  our  membership  in  said  corporatiton,  hereby 
mutually  agree  and  covenant  with  each  other,  and  with  the 
said  corporation,  that  we  will  in  our  actions  and  dealings  with 
each  other,  and  the  said  corporation,  be  in  all  respects,  gov- 
erned by  and  respect  the  Rules,  Regulations  and  By-Laws  of 
said  corporation,  as  they  now  exist,  or  as  they  may  be  here- 
after modified,  altered  or  amended.' 

"No  more  serious  or  valid  contract  can  be  signed  by  any 
one.  Any  violation  of  a  rule  of  this  Board  by  a  member  is 
an  act  of  bad  faith  to  each  one  of  his  associates,  and  a  dis- 
credit to  the  fair  name  of  the  Association.  It  is  the  highest 
duty  of  every  one  of  you  to  understand  your  rules  and  assist 
your  officers  in  maintaining  them.  Your  individual  and  hearty 
cooperation  is  necessary,  and  I  pledge  the  officers  you  have 
chosen  to  their  full  measure  of  duty." 

"In  an  Exchange  of  such  importance  as  ours,  there  is  and 


130        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

must  be  room  for  all.  No  single  or  selfish  interest  must  be 
permitted  to  dominate,  but  absolute  fairness  must  prevail. 
What  is  best  for  the  whole  Board  is  best  for  each  one  of  us, 
and  let  us  unite  in  raising  higher  and  even  higher  our  ideal, 
until  the  Chicago  Board  of  Trade  shall  be  the  standard  of 
integrity  and  commercial  ethics  wherever  known." 

My  father  undertook  the  fight  against  the  railroads 
because  of  their  unjust  discrimination  between  patrons 
who  were  favored  and  those  who  were  not.  His  con- 
tention is  summed  up  in  a  report  to  the  Board,  of  a 
committee  of  which  he  was  the  chairman,  in  whose 
behalf  he  declared  as  follows: 

"Your  committee  insists  upon  the  observance  on  the  part 
of  common  carriers  of  their  proper  attitude  to  the  public, 
namely :  that  these  lines  derive  their  franchise  from  the  people, 
and  to  the  people  without  discrimination  they  owe  an  equitable 
distribution  and  allotment  of  transportation  privileges,  includ- 
ing rates,  conveniences  and  facilities  for  business  at  terminal 
points ;  while  your  committee  concedes  that  transportation  lines 
are  entitled  to  reasonable  compensation  for  services  rendered, 
they  are  not  entitled  directly  or  indirectly  by  any  ingenious 
system  of  accounts  to  excess  rates." 

In  looking  backward  from  the  present  day  scene 
of  Harrimanism,  Father's  attitude  seems  at  least 
prophetic.  In  continuing  the  fight  on  bucket-shops, 
rigid  strictures  were  placed  upon  membership  in  the 
Board  of  Trade,  which  admitted  no  bucket-shops  to 
the  privilege  of  membership,  and  any  member  or  firm 
found  guilty  of  bucket-shopping,  directly  or  indirectly, 
was  suspended  from  membership;  also  the  rigid  en- 
forcements of  the  laws  of  Illinois  were  invoked  against 
the  grain  elevators  as  a  result  of  which  nine  licenses 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  131 

were  revoked  by  the  Warehouse  Commissioner  of  the 
State. 

When  his  third  term  of  office  drew  near  to  a  close, 
the  usual  division  of  sentiment  took  place,  with  the 
active  members  of  the  Board  on  one  side — who  in- 
sisted upon  Father  again  for  their  President,  and  the 
Armour  crowd,  the  elevator  men,  and  the  millionaire 
members  of  the  Board  upon  the  other  side  with  their 
candidate.  The  election  of  January,  1896,  therefore, 
was  the  hottest  in  the  history  of  the  Board  of  Trade ; 
and  it  is  noteworthy  in  this  connection  that  Father 
gave  the  situation  no  attention  whatsoever,  but  allowed 
matters  to  take  their  own  course.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  opposing  party  organized  a  most  vigorous  cam- 
paign. In  this  way  inactive  members  were  brought 
even  from  as  remote  points  as  Buffalo  to  come  and 
cast  their  vote  in  favor  of  the  elevator  monopoly  and 
the  bucket-shop  plague.  Carriages  were  sent  out  all 
over  the  city  to  bring  in  delinquent  members,  who  never 
attended  the  regular  sessions,  purely  for  the  purpose 
of  voting,  all  of  which,  however,  were  to  naught,  for 
when  the  polls  were  closed  and  the  votes  counted  it 
was  known  that  Father  had  received  777  votes,  as 
against  562  votes  for  his  opponent. 

He  therefore  entered  upon  his  duties  for  the  fourth 
time,  upon  his  own  platform  as  he  set  it  forth  in  his 
inaugural  address  of  that  year,  which  it  is  well  to 
incorporate  in  this  story  at  this  point,  calling  especial 
attention  to  his  remarks  upon  the  silver  question. 


132        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 


Chicago  Tribune  cartoon  upon  the  occasion  of  the  election  of 
William  T.  Baker  to  his  fourth  term  as  president. 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  133 

"Once  again  it  is  my  privilege  to  thank  you  for  the  honor 
you  have  conferred  upon  me.  This  renewed  expression  of 
your  confidence  and  esteem  is  all  the  recompense  I  ask  for 
such  service  as  I  shall  be  able  to  render  your  Association  for 
another  year." 

"On  the  beginning  of  this  new  year  I  think  we  are  justified 
in  anticipating  better  times  and  more  prosperous  business. 
But  there  are  three  obstacles  that  confront  us,  two  of  which 
are  peculiar  to  ourselves  but  from  which  the  entire  grain  trade 
both  East  and  West  is  suffering,  and  the  other  of  which  con- 
cerns not  us  alone  but  every  one  who  lives  or  expects  to  live 
in  the  United  States  of  America.  I  refer  to  the  bucket-shop 
iniquity,  the  elevator  monopoly  and  the  free-silver  lunacy. 
The  first  two  of  these  evils  are  local  in  their  origin,  though 
widespread  in  their  effects,  and  their  cure  must  depend  mainly 
on  ourselves.  The  last  can  be  averted  only  by  the  united 
efforts  of  business  men,  laboring  men  and  professional  men 
of  the  entire  country,  and  in  this  we  may  take  a  leading  part." 

"Your  Board  of  Directors  during  the  past  year  has  been 
united  in  its  purpose  to  suppress  bucket-shops  and  bucket-shop- 
ping, and  distinct  progress  has  been  made.  All  that  has 
been  attempted  has  borne  some  fruit,  and  it  is  likely  that 
future  operations  may  be  facilitated  by  a  more  general  appre- 
ciation by  the  community  of  what  bucket-shops  really  are.  It 
is  beginning  to  dawn  upon  the  comprehension  of  the  public 
that  every  one  connected  with  the  bucket-shops  are  thieves 
and  swindlers,  and  the  man  who  is  guilty  of  bucket-shop  prac- 
tices can  no  longer  shield  himself  under  the  cloak  of  respecta- 
bility. It  would  be  obviously  improper  to  indicate  in  detail 
what  may  be  proposed,  but  I  can  assure  you  that  no  effort 
will  be  spared  to  eradicate  this  evil.  Membership  in  this 
Board  will  not  shield  any  one  if  found  guilty,  for  it  must  be 
our  highest  aim  to  keep  the  roster  of  our  members  above  sus- 
picion, to  make  it,  in  fact,  a  roll  of  honor." 

"While  something  has  been  accomplished  toward  improving 


134        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

the  status  of  the  elevator  question,  there  is  much  remaining 
to  be  done.  The  law's  delay  has  been  invoked  against  you, 
not  with  the  hope  of  ultimate  success,  but  to  weary  you  and 
to  tire  you  out.  The  recent  court  decision  did  not  touch  the 
merits  of  our  cases,  which  will  be  pressed  with  such  vigor  as 
your  Directors  are  capable  of,  and  an  early  decision  is  hoped 
for.  There  is  some  misapprehension  apparent  outside  this 
Board  as  to  the  relation  of  elevator  companies  to  the  general 
business  of  the  city.  They  claim  to  be  public  benefactors,  in 
that  they  bring  grain  in  large  amounts  to  this  city  that  would 
otherwise  go  elsewhere.  This  is  said  to  furnish  employment 
to  more  banking  capital  and  keep  up  the  rate  of  interest  and  to 
give  business  to  railroads  and  insurance  companies.  But  we 
know  that  half  a  dozen  firms  and  corporations  have  a  monopoly 
of  the  business.  They  cannot  bring  grain  here  that  is  not 
naturally  tributary  to  us,  except  cut  rates  of  freight  denied 
the  general  public  and  forbidden  by  law.  Nearly  every  rail- 
road terminating  here  has  some  favored  elevator  system  under 
its  protection,  the  proprietors  of  which  are  given  such  profit- 
able concessions  as  to  enable  them  to  control  the  business.  If 
the  contention  of  this  Board  is  sustained  each  railroad  will 
have  a  host  of  competing  patrons  instead  of  one ;  bankers  will 
have  a  thousand  active  accounts  instead  of  the  small  group  of 
large  borrowers  who  are  now  able  to  combine  and  dictate 
rates,  while  the  short  rate  card  of  insurance  offices  will  again 
come  into  use." 

"But  the  real  question  is  not  whether  it  may  add  to 
the  traffic  of  railroads  or  increase  the  profits  of  bank- 
ing or  insurance  capital,  but  whether  it  is  right  for  public 
custodians  of  grain  to  be  at  the  same  time  dealers  in  grain  and 
enabled  to  select  and  set  aside  for  their  own  purposes  the  best 
of  what  may  come  under  their  charge.  No  objection  is  made 
to  all  the  grain  coming  to  Chicago  that  can  be  legitimately 
brought  here,  but  it  is  against  public  policy,  and  is  not  the 
legitimate  function  of  a  public  warehouseman,  operating  under 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  135 

a  license  from  the  State  and  the  rules  of  this  Board,  to  be 
so  engaged.  It  is  the  dual  capacity  that  we  object  to  and  that 
is  prohibited  by  law.  Last  spring  the  quality  of  millions  of 
bushels  of  grain  stored  in  public  warehouses  was  aspersed  by 
interested  speculators.  This  Board,  through  its  officers,  sought 
to  have  such  an  investigation  made  as  would  refute  the  slander 
against  grain  stored  in  public  warehouses  and  restore  the 
confidence  of  buyers  and  holders  of  property  made  regular  by 
our  rules.  But  every  elevator  proprietor  in  Chicago  joined  in 
refusing  permission  to  your  representatives  to  make  that  neces- 
sary and  wholesome  examination.  They  knew  the  grain  was 
above  the  average  in  quality  and  condition  but  were  unwilling 
to  have  it  inspected  in  order  to  increase  the  carrying  charges. 
The  present  monopoly  is  against  everything  and  everybody 
but  themselves." 

"By  the  rankest  and  most  brazen  manipulation  they  seek 
to  control  the  price  and  movement  of  our  commodities  and 
force  every  buyer  and  every  seller  to  their  terms.  A  year 
ago  they  were  selling  Spring  Wheat  at  5  or  6  cents  premium. 
Now  they  are  selling  Winter  Wheat  at  a  like  premium,  while 
they  have  not  been  the  owners  of  either.  While  they  are 
nominally  the  custodians  of  your  property  they  are  able  in 
violation  of  the  laws  of  the  State,  to  set  aside  and  sell  at  a 
premium  millions  of  bushels  every  year,  not  owned  by  them 
but  in  their  custody  as  warehousemen.  Would  any  court 
permit  a  trustee  of  an  estate  to  thus  handle  trust  funds  for 
his  own  advantage?  This  gain  is  not  the  legitimate  property 
of  a  public  warehouseman.  It  belongs  to  you  or  whoever 
owns  the  grain.  The  lawful  profit  of  the  business  of  public 
warehousing  has  been  attractive  enough  to  create  an  enormous 
system  of  elevators  here.  If  the  business  has  been  overdone  it 
is  due  to  the  cupidity  of  those  engaged  in  it.  This  Board 
will  cheerfully  concede  a  fair  return  on  capital  actually 
employed  in  lawful  operation  of  elevators,  but  will  forever 
resist  the  use  of  its  machinery  for  unjust  or  illegal  practices. 


136        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

If  it  is  possible  to  close  the  courts  against  us  we  have  remedies 
within  our  own  Association  that  neither  money  nor  influence 
can  buy." 

"The  pulse  of  business  is  sought  in  the  great  exchanges  of 
the  country  and  nowhere  is  it  more  sensitive  than  in  this 
Board  of  Trade.  Whatever  affects  the  weal  or  woe  of  the 
commerce  of  this  country  is  immediately  reflected  here,  so 
that  no  class  of  business  men  can  have  greater  interest  than 
we  in  the  impending  crisis  in  national  finances." 

"All  our  internal  differences  are  small  or  of  passing  import- 
ance compared  with  the  one  great  question  whether  the  credit 
of  the  nation  is  to  be  sacrificed  through  the  ignorance  or 
demagoguery  of  Congress.  Between  the  rapacity  of  the  mine 
owners,  who  among  their  other  assets  are  able  to  schedule 
Senators  of  the  United  States,  and  the  zeal  of  politicians  whose 
patriotism  is  bounded  by  their  partisanship,  we  are  in  constant 
danger  of  drifting  to  a  silver  basis.  The  treasury  is  forced 
to  dubious  expedients  in  order  to  postpone  the  calamity. 
These  expedients  are  likely  to  be  less  effectual  and  more 
embarrassing  as  our  stock  of  gold  is  drawn  upon  for  export, 
and  no  matter  what  party  may  control  the  government,  there 
can  be  but  one  final  result  from  present  conditions.  Our  stock 
of  gold  is  not  unlimited,  and  the  drain  upon  it  will  never  per- 
manently cease  until  we  turn  from  the  blind  fatuity  of  forcing 
the  circulation  of  a  good  dollar  and  a  bad  dollar  side  by  side 
on  equal  terms." 

"In  our  transactions  on  'Change  No.  2,  Spring  Wheat  and 
No.  2,  Red  Winter  Wheat  are  each  a  legal  tender  on  contracts. 
We  have  the  double  standard,  and  for  years  past  we  have  seen 
that  it  is  the  kind  that  has  least  commercial  value  that  weighs 
upon  the  market.  The  better  or  more  valuable  grade  dis- 
appears— is  either  hoarded  or  shipped  away,  while  the  cheaper 
or  less  desirable  kind  remains  to  plague  us.  This  is  a  forcible 
though  familiar  illustration  of  the  operation  of  the  Gresham 
law,  the  law  that  never  in  the  world's  history  has  failed  to 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  137 

operate  when  the  money  of  the  country  has  a  varying  or 
unequal  standard.  We  encourage  the  speedy  and  ceaseless 
operation  of  this  law  by  a  system  of  legislation  which,  if 
intended  to  drive  gold  from  circulation,  could  not  have  been 
more  ingeniously  devised." 

"In  order  to  maintain  the  credit  of  the  government  by 
keeping  parity  between  gold  and  silver  as  required  by  law,  the 
treasury  must  redeem  greenbacks  and  Sherman  notes  in  gold, 
and  this  redemption  is  accompanied  by  the  absurd  requirement 
that  such  money  must  be  paid  out  again  and  kept  in  circula- 
tion, to  be  again  and  again  redeemed  in  gold.  This  imbecile 
legislative  contrivance  has  placed  us  at  the  mercy  of  foreign 
enemies  or  alien  speculators  in  bullion,  and  recent  events 
have  shown  us  that  such  enemies  and  speculators  know  their 
advantage  and  are  not  slow  to  profit  by  our  weakness.  There 
is  but  one  remedy  for  this  deplorable  condition  of  affairs.  Pro- 
vision must  be  made  for  the  permanent  retirement  of  the  five 
hundred  millions  of  greenbacks  and  Sherman  notes.  Long 
time  bonds  bearing  a  low  rate  of  interest  and  payable  in  gold 
should  be  authorized  for  this  purpose,  and  if  such  bonds  were 
permitted  to  be  used  by  national  banks  as  security  for  circu- 
lation redeemable  in  gold,  they  would  be  quickly  absorbed, 
and  the  transition  would  be  easily  and  safely  made;  all  the 
hoarded  gold  in  the  country  would  immediately  come  back 
into  circulation  and  this  country  would  enter  upon  an  era 
of  unexampled  prosperity.  There  is  no  politics  in  this  propo- 
sition. There  are  only  partisanship,  ignorance  and  greed 
opposed  to  it.  There  should  be  patriotism  enough  in  Congress 
to  take  this,  the  only  wise  course  to  restore  American  credit 
and  invite  the  capital  of  the  world  to  American  enterprises.  It 
would  restore  confidence  and  start  the  wheels  of  every  mill 
and  give  employment  to  all  the  unemployed,  and  labor  would 
continue  to  be  paid  in  money  worth  100  cents  on  the  dollar." 

"The  prospect  of  any  intelligent  legislation  is  at  this  time 
doubtful,  but  it  is  nevertheless  the  duty  of  every  business  man 


138        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

who  knows  the  value  of  credit  in  business  enterprises,  and  of 
every  citizen  who  cherishes  the  honor  of  his  country  to  cry 
out  in  protest  against  the  puerility  of  Congress.  No  man  who 
represents  an  honest  and  intelligent  constituency  in  either 
house  of  Congress  who  fails  in  his  duty  on  this  supreme 
question  can  look  for  future  preferment.  But  the  next  elec- 
tion is  a  long  way  off.  We  should  not  wait  to  get  at  them 
with  our  votes,  for  delay  may  mean  ruin  to  the  business  of 
the  country.  Let  every  one  of  us  by  letter  or  petition  or  in 
any  way  in  which  we  can  make  our  influence  felt,  do  what  we 
may  to  secure  this  currency  reform  and  save  the  country  from 
humiliation  and  disgrace.  This  Board  of  Trade  controlling 
the  commerce  of  the  Northwest  can  serve  no  higher  purpose 
than  to  lead  in  this  crusade  in  behalf  of  the  national  honor 
as  it  has  always  led  in  patriotic  endeavor." 

It  will  be  remembered  in  this  connection,  that  con- 
temporaneously with  his  serving  as  President  of  the 
Board  of  Trade  during  his  last  three  terms,  my  father 
was  likewise  President  of  the  Civic  Federation,  the 
co-operation  of  which  organization  he  was  therefore 
always  able  to  command  in  putting  down  infractions 
of  law  and  morality  in  connection  with  the  grain  trade. 
His  fourth  administration  continued  its  crusade 
against  the  bucket-shops  and  the  elevator  iniquities, 
and  developed  new  reforms.  The  history  of  this  year 
was  largely  a  repetition  of  the  year  preceding  it,  and  it 
ended  with  much  good  accomplished,  and  with  the 
sentiment  prevailing  as  usual  among  the  members  of 
the  Board  that  he  must  again  and  for  the  fifth  time 
be  the  President  of  the  organization.  In  fact,  it  is 
likely  that  had  he  been  willing,  he  would  have  been 
elected  President  of  the  Board  of  Trade  for  the  rest 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  139 

of  his  life.  Never  in  the  history  of  the  Board  had 
any  one  member  been  elected  its  President  for  a  fifth 
time,  or  even  a  fourth  time,  and  my  father,  therefore, 
stands  alone  in  its  history  with  this  unique  honor  rest- 
ing upon  him.  He  was  elected  in  January,  1897,  to 
serve  for  that  year.  So  unusual  was  the  distinction 
of  a  fifth  term  that  it  called  forth  editorials  from  the 
leading  press  of  the  city,  but  I  call  particular  attention 
to  that  in  the  Times  Herald  of  January  13,  1897,  as 
follows : 

"For  the  fifth  time  Mr.  William  T.  Baker  has  been  called 
to  the  presidency  of  the  Board  of  Trade,  an  honor  so  unusual 
and  so  unprecedented  that  it  is  in  itself  conclusive  proof  of 
the  value  the  members  of  the  board  place  upon  the  services 
of  their  distinguished  associate.  And,  indeed,  not  only  in  the 
eyes  of  his  fellow  members,  but  in  the  eyes  of  his  fellow 
citizens,  President  Baker  is  deserving  of  this  high  esteem.  He 
has  stood  before  the  community  as  a  man  faithful  in  the  dis- 
charge of  the  duties  of  citizenship,  zealous  for  every  good 
work  and  reform,  and  ever  keeping  in  mind  the  highest  civil 
ideals  of  business,  jealous  to  the  quick  of  everything  that 
tends  to  the  degradation  of  the  honorable  name  of  merchant." 

"Animated  by  such  feelings,  he  has  sought  to  purge  the 
floor  of  the  great  mart  of  the  rapacious  and  the  dishonest 
of  mercantile  welshers  and  of  those  who  make  victims  of  their 
patrons.  The  records  of  the  board  show  how  well  he  has  suc- 
ceeded, and  how  dangerous  to  themselves  it  is  for  the  tricky 
and  the  unscrupulous  to  perpetrate  their  frauds  on  the  floor 
of  the  exchange." 

"In  his  annual  address  on  Monday  President  Baker  re- 
viewed some  of  the  reforms  that  had  been  accomplished  in  the 
past  and  mentioned  others  that  were  yet  to  be  accomplished." 

"The  first  battle  with  the  elevator  monopoly  has  resulted 


140        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

in,  a  legal  victory  that  in  all  probability  will  be  final.  This 
has  been  the  chief  gain  of  the  year.  The  war  against  the 
bucket-shops  still  continues,  but  President  Baker  promises  that 
the  crusade  against  those  swindling  gambling  shops  shall  con- 
tinue until  success  is  achieved." 

"Another  subject  of  vital  importance  to  the  board  is  the 
system  of  grain  inspection  and  the  methods  of  appointing  grain 
inspectors.  Gradually  the  politicians  have  been  getting  a  greater 
and  greater  hold  on  this  department,  and  ward  heelers  and 
political  dependents  have  found  their  way  to  the  pay  rolls.  This 
is  too  serious  a  matter  to  be  lightly  passed  over,  and  it  is  recom- 
mended that  an  effort  be  made  to  place  the  inspection  depart- 
ment under  civil  service  rules.  If  this  is  refused  by  the 
Legislature  the  board  should  assert  its  chartered  rights  and 
have  an  inspection  system  of  its  own." 

"The  Times-Herald  congratulates  President  Baker  on  his 
re-election  and  upon  the  honorable  career  that  has  been 
crowned  with  this  distinction.  Long  may  he  illustrate  by  pre- 
cept and  example  the  highest  standards  of  commercial 
morality !" 

As  setting  forth  concisely  his  work  of  the  preceding 
year,  and  the  hopes  and  purposes  of  his  administration 
for  the  year  to  come,  and  his  pronounced  convictions 
upon  currency  reform,  I  will  add  here  his  fifth  and 
last  inaugural  address  as  a  part  of  his  life's  story: 

"In  accepting  the  office  to  which  you  have  a  fifth  time 
elected  me,  I  acknowledge  the  obligation  due  you  for  the 
unusual  honor,  and  shall  endeavor  to  show  my  appreciation  of 
it  by  such  fidelity  and  care  for  the  interests  of  this  Board  as 
my  limitations  will  permit." 

"I  congratulate  the  members  of  this  board  on  a  fairly  pros- 
perous business  during  the  past  year,  and  on  the  prospects  of 
still  better  times  to  come.  The  year  has  been  marked  by  most 
alarming  vicissitudes  in  all  branches  of  business  in  this  country, 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  141 

and  I  therefore  felicitate  you  that  failures  have  been  almost 
unknown  among  us,  and  that  you  have  closed  the  year 
generally  with  a  balance  on  the  right  side  of  the  ledger.  I 
sincerely  hope  the  improvement  in  business  here  is  the  har- 
binger of  prosperity  for  the  whole  country,  for  we  can  hardly 
expect  permanent  improvement  in  which  all  branches  of  indus- 
try do  not  share.  We  are  therefore  justified  in  exerting  our 
influence  whenever  we  can  do  so  in  the  direction  of  improv- 
ing present  conditions,  and  especially  for  such  congressional 
enactments  as  will  relieve  us  from  the  peril  that  has  already 
nearly  wrecked  the  country." 

"Politics  and  business  have  become  so  closely  allied  that 
we  can  scarcely  discuss  business  concerns  of  the  first  import- 
ance to  every  one  without  inviting  the  imputation  of  partisan- 
ship. The  tendency  of  our  time  forbids  the  hope  of  such 
an  Utopian  condition  that  merely  academic  discussion  of 
National  questions  will  be  possible.  The  people  have  so  long 
been  taught  that  the  principal  function  of  government 
is  to  do  something  for  everybody,  that  every  citizen  looks 
to  Washington  with  hope  and  fear,  and  it  is  only  by  frank 
expressions  of  business  men  that  vital  errors  may  be  avoided. 
We  owe  it  to  ourselves,  therefore,  and  to  the  business  com- 
munity of  which  we  are  a  part,  to  give  vigorous  expression 
of  our  views  on  business  questions  on  which  legislation  by 
Congress  is  likely  or  desirable.  There  is  no  place  where  such 
questions  can  be  discussed  more  dispassionately  than  in  this 
Board  of  Trade,  for  no  member  of  it  is  or  expects  to  be  a 
beneficiary  of  any  act  of  Congress  further  than  any  citizen 
is  benefitted  by  honest  legislation  for  the  public  good." 

"The  currency  question  is  as  far  from  being  settled  as  it  has 
been  at  any  time  since  the  repeal  of  the  Sherman  Act.  All  the 
machinery  for  precipitating  the  country  to  a  silver  basis  is 
in  perfect  order,  and  ready  to  operate  whenever  anything  occurs 
to  arouse  suspicion  or  start  alarm.  It  is  criminal  folly  for 
business  men  to  lapse  into  indifference  again  until  the  treas- 


142        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

ury  surplus  approaches  the  danger  line.  It  is  positively  mon- 
strous that  the  whole  business  fabric  of  this  country  and  the 
honor  and  credit  of  the  government  should  be  permitted  to 
continue  at  the  mercy  of  circumstances  that  may  arise  at  any 
time,  and  are  as  sure  to  arise  some  time  in  the  future  as  they 
have  already  in  the  recent  past.  The  last  election  barely 
extinguished  the  burning  fuse  that  led  to  the  mine,  but  the 
mine  is  still  there,  and  the  danger,  though  less  imminent,  is 
just  as  great  as  it  always  has  been  since  our  currency  laws 
were  enacted.  It  is  the  paramount  duty  of  Congress  to  revise 
these  laws,  to  take  the  government  out  of  banking  business  by 
retiring  all  its  demand  notes  and  substituting  National  bank 
notes  redeemable  in  gold.  Practically  the  only  issue  in  the 
last  campaign  was  the  money  issue.  Familiar  questions  of 
political  economy  were  either  ignored  or  perfunctorily  dis- 
cussed as  evidence  of  party  consistency,  but  the  appeal  to  the 
intelligent  electorate  was  for  honest  money,  and  more  than 
two  millions  of  voters  laid  aside  their  most  cherished  convic- 
tions in  voting  with  the  majority  to  save  the  National  honor. 
I  believe  they  now  have  a  right  to  demand  that  those  with 
whom  they  voted  shall  be  equally  patriotic,  and  put  all  other 
party  questions  behind  them  until  the  currency  question,  on 
which  they  were  agreed,  is  settled  and  settled  forever.  The 
people  can  afford  to  wait  for  increased  taxation,  but  they 
cannot  afford  to  wait  for  that  return  of  confidence  which  a 
proper  reform  of  our  curency  laws  will  bring  about,  and 
which  nothing  else  in  the  way  of  legislation  will  accomplish." 
"The  question  between  the  board  and  the  elevator  pro- 
prietors has  reached  a  decision  in  the  Circuit  Court  in  our 
favor  on  every  controverted  point.  The  decision  of  Judge 
Tuley  is  so  comprehensive  and  convincing  that  the  elevator 
proprietors  can  hardly  hope  to  have  it  reversed  by  the  Supreme 
Court,  though  they  have  taken  an  appeal.  I  earnestly  recom- 
mend that  no  backward  step  be  taken  by  this  board.  There 
has  been  nothing  in  the  events  of  the  past  year  to  make  the 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  143 

elevator  monopoly  more  endurable.  Their  control  of  the 
property  of  which  they  should  be  simply  guardians  or  trustees, 
the  property  which  does  not  belong  to  them  but  to  the  members 
of  this  board  to  whom  they  have  sold  it,  has  enabled  them 
not  only  to  manipulate  prices,  but  to  create  intolerable  obstruc- 
tions to  the  free  current  of  commerce  which  is  the  most  import- 
ant function  of  this  board  to  foster.  The  legitimate  storage 
charge  is  no  longer  a  prime  consideration  with  them.  Their 
alliance  with  the  railroads  and  the  privilege  and  immunities 
enjoyed  by  them  on  this  board  enables  them  to  levy  tribute  on 
producer  and  consumer  alike,  while  the  centralization  of  the 
control  of  stocks  of  grain  in  store  robs  the  banker  and  the 
common  carrier  of  the  legitimate  advantage  of  competition 
that  would  come  with  a  restoration  of  the  natural  order  of 
business.  This  board  has  never  questioned  the  right  of  any 
of  its  members  to  deal  in  grain  and  store  it  in  their  own 
warehouses,  but  when  its  members  elect  to  do  such  business 
they  should  not  at  the  same  time  become  public  warehousemen 
with  the  stamp  of  regularity  on  their  warehouse  receipts.  The 
opportunity  to  select  and  sell  at  a  premium  the  best  of  a 
grade  while  offering  holders  of  their  receipts  the  poorest,  is 
a  manifest  injustice  and  contrary  to  public  policy.  The  market 
price  is  always  based  on  the  least  desirable,  while  for  the  better 
qualities  such  a  premium  as  the  necessities  or  desires  of  con- 
sumers may  warrant,  is  exacted  by  the  custodians  of  the  prop- 
erty who  do  not  even  pretend  to  be  its  real  owners.  The  well 
known  fact  that  the  poorest  quality  that  is  deliverable  on  con- 
tracts establishes  the  price  of  the  entire  stock  in  store,  and  to 
a  certain  extent  depresses  the  general  market,  is  a  constant 
injustice  to  producers  in  all  the  territory  tributary  to  our 
market.  It  is  an  application  of  the  pinciples  of  the  Gresham 
law  to  the  familiar  operations  of  the  grain  market  that  must 
be  intelligible  to  anybody." 

"The   integrity    of    the    system    of    grain    inspection    in 
this     district     is     marked     on     our    exchange,     and     though 


144        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

we  have  no  voice  in  the  management  of  the  inspec- 
tion department,  yet  our  credit  is  impaired  and  our  business 
injured  by  its  inefficiency.  When  the  inspection  of  grain  was 
surrendered  by  this  board  to  the  State  in  compliance  with  the 
warehouse  law,  we  had  reason  to  expect  faithful  and  uniform 
administration  of  the  service.  For  many  years  we  had  no 
ground  for  serious  complaint,  but  it  has  gradually  become  a 
useful  part  of  machine  politics,  and  ward  heelers  are  crowded 
upon  the  pay  rolls  without  regard  to  the  technical  require- 
ments of  the  work.  The  inspection  department  should  be 
petitioned  to  pass  a  bill  to  this  end.  An  effort  was  made  at 
the  last  meeting  of  the  Legislature  to  accomplish  this  but 
failed.  If  such  an  act  cannot  be  passed  by  the  present  Legis- 
lature, it  may  be  well  to  consider  the  propriety  of  asserting  our 
rights  under  our  charter  and  have  our  own  inspection  system." 

"The  extermination  of  bucket-shops  should  continue  to  be 
the  aim  of  this  board.  It  is  no  longer  necessary  to  explain 
their  practices  to  convince  the  community  of  their  viciousness. 
The  public  has  come  to  understand  their  pernicious  effects  and 
their  demoralizing  influence.  They  furnish  the  most  attractive 
gambling  hells  in  every  city  and  village  where  they  can  effect 
a  lodgment,  and  are  more  dangerous  to  public  morals  than 
other  forms  of  gambling  because  of  the  quasi-respectability 
and  immunity  from  police  raids.  Their  proprietors  are  without 
exception  thieves  and  swindlers." 

"Bucket-shops  and  pool-rooms  are  twin  outlaws  in  nearly 
every  State  in  the  Union.  Their  united  corruption  fund  has 
enabled  them  to  baffle  justice  by  debauchery  of  the  constituted 
authority  for  the  investigation  and  prosecution  of  crime,  but 
they  could  not  continue  in  existence  a  day  but  for  their  alliance 
with  the  Western  Union  Telegraph  Company.  That  company 
furnishes  all  the  machinery  and  all  the  news  on  which  bets  are 
laid,  and  it  is  the  only  telegraph  company  in  the  United  States 
that  leases  wires  for  the  private  use  of  bucket-shops  in  swindling 
their  patrons.  The  spectacle  of  a  corporation  with  a  hundred 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  145 

million  dollars  capital  paying  dividends  gleaned  from  the  vice 
and  crime  of  the  country  is  one  to  make  any  American  blush. 
Contrast  this  with  the  conduct  of  some  of  the  great  news- 
papers of  this  city,  which  cannot  be  hired  to  print  the  harmless 
appearing  advertisements  of  bucket-shops.  It  may  be  said 
that  a  great  commercial  organization  like  this  has  no  need  to 
concern  itself  with  questions  of  morals,  but  the  ethics  of  busi- 
ness are  based  on  a  high  standard  of  commercial  morality, 
which  it  is  our  duty  to  preach  and  to  practice.  When  we 
see  our  efforts  to  rid  ourselves  of  the  incubus  of  bucket-shops 
embarrassed  by  such  a  condition  as  is  here  outlined,  we  find 
our  self-interest  exalted  by  our  patriotic  duty  as  citizens  in 
striking  down  a  wrong.  The  crusade  in  which  we  have  been 
so  long  engaged  will  not  cease.  Complete  success  will,  how- 
ever, be  hastened  by  our  maintaining  among  ourselves  an 
unimpeachable  standard  of  business  honor.  Our  rules  are 
based  on  such  a  standard,  and  if  any  member  is  unfaithful 
to  them,  it  is  your  duty,  individually,  to  expose  the  derelict 
and  aid  your  officers  in  purging  your  membership  of  any  who 
are  found  unworthy  to  enjoy  its  privileges." 

"Let  us  enter  upon  the  new  year  with  a  renewed  pledge  of 
loyalty  to  this  great  exchange  and  a  determination  to  keep 
its  honor  above  suspicion,  so  that  our  membership  in  it  may 
be  a  source  of  pride  and  gratification  to  us  and  to  our  children." 

It  was  in  this  last  term  that  Governor  Tanner  of  the 
State  of  Illinois  and  the  Board  of  Trade  came 
into  conflict.  The  Governor  had  made  a  good 
deal  of  money  on  the  Board  of  Trade  through 
some  of  his  brokers,  which  fact  he  did  not  deplore, 
but  he  did  hold  resentment  against  the  Board 
of  Trade  for  an  attack  made  upon  him  in  connec- 
tion with  standing  in  with  the  crooked  element 
and  vetoing  certain  legislation  which  the  Board 


146 


LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 


mw\ ,i,\>  _/]-.  *kWfa*—^.'A 


THE  BOARD   OF   TRADE-GOV.  TANNER'S  "MONTE    CARLO"— AS    SEEN    BY  FURNISS. 

g  the   Governor's   hostility  to    President 
Chicago  Tribune  cartoon  of  June  8,  1897. 


Illustrating  the   Governor's   hostility  to    President    Baker. 
Ch' 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  147 

of  Trade  had  championed  for  the  purpose  of  puri- 
fying the  trade  of  the  evil  things  which  beset  it. 
This  led  the  Governor  in  an  interview  with  a  reporter 
of  the  Tribune  to  say  that  "The  Chicago  Board  of 
Trade  was  the  biggest  gambling  place  on  earth,  Monte 
Carlo  not  excepted.  I  retort,  that  if  Mr.  Baker  or 
any  of  his  friends  so  desire  I  can  give  proof,  facts  and 
figures  to  substantiate  what  I  said,  and  now  empha- 
size in  that  respect."  The  Governor's  tirade  was  em- 
bodied in  a  personal  attack  upon  Father  as  the  official 
head  of  the  organization.  It  resulted  in  an  amusing 
cartoon  being  published  of  Chicago's  Temple  of  Com- 
merce which  is  interesting  enough  to  be  reproduced 
in  this  book. 

The  year  1897  was  a  most  prosperous  one  for  the 
Board  of  Trade.  In  this  year  Father  succeeded  in 
getting  the  Post  Office  Department  to  order  the  word 
"fraudulent"  stamped  on  all  letters  sent  to  bucket- 
shops,  so  that  no  bucket-shops  closed  up  in  conse- 
quence, while  58  were  closed  by  fraud  orders,  26  by 
indictments,  and  26  grew  weary  of  the  struggle  and 
went  out  of  business.  The  liquidation  throughout  the 
country  had  ceased  and  the  great  depression  was  at 
an  end.  The  stocks  and  goods  of  all  merchants  were 
low,  and  the  demand  for  new  goods  was  brisk,  which 
stimulated  industry  and  trade  in  every  channel.  As 
high  prices  obtained  more  and  more  for  the  cereals, 
the  price  of  silver  went  down,  which  did  much  to 
cure  the  people  of  the  silver  heresy  that  had  been 
during  the  preceding  years  disturbing  financial  con- 


148         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

ditions  so  disastrously.  The  price  of  wheat  soaring 
above  a  dollar,  and  the  great  Leiter  wheat  corner  were 
the  principal  Board  of  Trade  events  that  will  go  down 
in  its  history  for  that  year. 

The  Chicago  Board  of  Trade  is  a  member  of 
the  National  Board  of  Trade  which  meets  each  year  in 
the  different  cities.  My  father  was  the  delegate  to  the 
National  Board  of  Trade  in  the  years  of  1882-83-87- 
88-89.  He  was  most  active  in  debate  and  had  very 
pronounced  views  on  all  subjects  coming  before  that 
body  bearing  upon  the  then  current  questions  of  the 
day.  The  records  show  that  he  addressed  the  meeting 
in  1882  upon  the  subject  of  the  Hawaiian  Treaty, 
Postal  Telegraph,  and  the  Shipping  question,  in 
Washington.  In  1887  in  Washington  he  addressed 
the  meeting  on  the  subject  of  the  Agricultural  Bureau 
Reports,  Postal  Telegraph,  the  Shipping  question,  the 
Silver  question  and  the  Tariff.  In  1888  in  Chicago 
he  spoke  upon  the  subject  of  the  Lard  adulterations 
and  Crop  bulletins,  and  again  in  the  same  year  in 
Washington  he  spoke  on  Agricultural  Statistics, 
River  and  Harbor  Improvements,  the  Shipping  ques- 
tion, Finance  and  Currency,  and  Tariff  Reform.  At 
Louisville  in  1889  he  discussed  the  National  Clearing 
House,  the  Independent  Telegraph  Company,  the 
Shipping  bill,  and  Penny  postage. 

Although  my  father  commanded  the  universal  re- 
spect of  the  Board  of  Trade  members  by  virtue  of  his 
distinguished  ability  and  his  high  character,  yet 
it  was  accorded  to  him  in  an  unusual  way 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  149 

not  given  to  other  men  who  might  have  been 
entitled  to  .  equal  respect.  Great  deference  was 
paid  to  his  personal  feelings  and  pleasure  in 
the  same  way  that  a  good  boy  pays  deference  to 
his  parents.  There  are  occasions  on  the  Board  of 
Trade,  notably  on  New  Year's  Day  when  the  crowd 
breaks  loose  and  indulges  in  antics  such  as  they  used  to 
do  when  they  were  school  boys.  Flour  sacks  and  grain 
sacks  are  thrown  at  each  other,  and  hats  knocked  off, 
but  if  in  the  midst  of  such  pandemonium,  Father 
would  happen  to  come  in  upon  the  floor  of  the  Ex- 
change, the  racket  would  cease  immediately,  and  busi- 
ness would  go  on  peacefully  again  just  as  though  the 
members  were  all  good  little  boys  who  had  turned  to 
their  books  again  when  the  teacher  came  in  sight. 

One  of  the  strongest  points  of  my  father's  char- 
acter was  his  instinctive  sense  of  justice.  This  was 
recognized  in  a  most  practical  way  on  the  Board  of 
Trade,  where,  during  the  later  years  of  his  life,  he 
was  looked  upon  as  a  tribunal  of  justice  and  the  court 
of  last  resort,  before  whom  disputing  members  of  the 
Board  of  Trade  would  lay  their  grievances  and  dis- 
putes. He  was  by  common  consent,  set  up  as  their 
judge  and  jury  and  they  invariably  referred  their  mat- 
ters to  him  and  accepted  his  decision  as  final.  Since 
his  death  a  special  committee  of  the  Board  of  Trade 
has  acted  in  this  capacity.  I  think  no  higher  compli- 
ment can  be  paid  a  man  than  to  have  him  involuntarily 
made  the  referee  of  disputes  where  great  sums  of 
money  and  friendships  are  inovlved.  When  left  to 


150         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

him  they  always  knew  that  his  determination  of  their 
equities  would  be  founded  upon  the  most  rigid  hon- 
esty and  superlative  wisdom. 

The  administration  of  his  fifth  term  came  to  its 
end,  and  thus  ended  his  official  connection  with  the 
management  of  the  Board  of  Trade,  although  his  suc- 
cessors in  office  looked  largely  to  him  for  advice  and 
guidance  as  the  Nestor  and  oracle  among  their  coun- 
sellors. The  members  of  the  Board  will  always  look 
back  with  affection  and  regard  for  their  great  leader, 
who  will  always  appear  to  them  as  the  Napoleon  who 
came  upon  the  scene  at  the  time  of  a  great  crisis, 
did  his  duty,  fought  their  fights,  and  then  re- 
tired with  the  honor  and  respect  of  all.  When  he  died, 
the  strongest  pillar  of  the  group  fell  down  and  a  prop 
went  out  from  under  the  Board  of  Trade.  Other  pil- 
lars have  fallen  and  other  props  have  gone  out,  and 
it  does  not  seem  that  the  Board  of  Trade  of  today  is 
the  same  as  of  old,  or  occupies  the  same  stronghold 
that  it  did  in  days  of  yore.  It  is  possible  that  the 
building  of  railroads  and  the  shifting  of  commercial 
centres  has  done  much  to  relieve  the  Board  of  Trade 
of  its  ancient  splendor  and  prestige,  while  the  shift- 
ing of  the  logical  scene  of  its  best  usefulness  to  other 
cities  in  the  land,  and  the  changed  conditions  effecting 
agriculture  and  commerce,  have  put  their  shadows 
upon  the  Board  of  Trade.  The  arteries  of  trade 
which  at  one  time  found  their  most  natural  way 
through  the  pit  of  that  Exchange,  now  take  shorter 
cuts — avoiding  the  middlemen,  and  thus  eliminating 


CHICAGO  BOARD  OF  TRADE  151 

or  reducing  commissions,  and  go  past  it  to  other  centres. 
Is  it  altogether  this  that  has  happened,  or  is  it  that 
the  men  of  old  are  not  there  now  to  uphold  its  dignity 
and  its  old  time  power  ?  And  if  such  be  the  case,  is  it 
that  changing  conditions — the  product  of  which  is 
men — have  ceased  to  produce  in  the  same  manner  and 
quality  as  when  the  Board  of  Trade  was  in  the  meri- 
dian of  its  career? 


1890-1893 

AS  the  ending  of  the  period  of  four  hundred 
years  following  the  discovery  of  America  by 
Christopher  Columbus  in  1492  began  to  come 
to  its  close,  there  developed  in  the  minds  of  our  coun- 
try's leaders  the  thought  that  special  significance  at- 
tached to  the  coming  event,  and  that  it  should  be  duly 
celebrated  accordingly  in  a  manner  characteristic  of 
American  spirit  and  enterprise.  As  the  idea  crystal- 
ized  into  more  definite  form  it  was  determined  as  the 
climax  of  the  four  centuries  of  development  in  Amer- 
ica to  hold  a  world's  exposition  of  the  progress,  not 
only  of  America,  but  of  all  nations,  in  the  arts,  indus- 
tries and  science  down  to  the  time  of  holding  it. 
Finally  in  1889  a  bill  was  introduced  in  Congress  for 
the  purpose  of  inaugurating  the  exposition  and  con- 
ducting it  in  a  befitting  manner.  Then  there  arose 
great  rivalry  between  the  several  principal  cities  of 
the  United  States  that  were  contending  with  each 
other  for  the  honor  of  holding  it,  the  chief  contestants 
being  New  York,  Chicago,  Washington  and  St. 
Louis. 

At  this  time  my  father  became  active  in  the  agita- 
tion as  far  as  Chicago  was  concerned,  and  he  was 
particularly  instrumental  in  obtaining  the  honor  for 


154         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

Chicago  through  his  influence  and  personal  presence 
at  Washington  where  he  was  well  and  favorably 
known  to  public  men  in  general  and  particularly  to 
President  Cleveland,  whose  champion  he  had  been  as 
a  Cleveland  Republican  or  Mugwump  during  his  first 
Presidential  campaign.  He  therefore  was  present  at 
Washington  with  others  of  the  committee  to  push  the 
claims  of  Chicago  at  the  several  times  the  matter  came 
up  in  Congress  for  discussion  and  decision.  Tre- 
mendous opposition  was  brought  against  Chicago  in 
favor  of  other  cities,  but  her  claims  to  the  distinction 
finally  prevailed  over  all  other  contestants  as  a  result 
of  the  extraordinary  perseverance  and  forceful  work 
of  the  committee  in  proving  to  Congress  the  superior 
advantages  which  Chicago  would  be  able  to  afford 
for  the  occasion,  and  her  ability  to  cope  successfully 
with  the  great  problem.  The  result  was  that  the  bill 
authorizing  the  exposition  passed  in  Congress  on 
April  25,  1890.  This  provided  for  a  national  com- 
mission for  exercising  functions  national  in  character 
pertaining  to  the  exposition ;  while  the  actual  work  of 
preparing  for  the  exposition,  financing  it,  erecting  the 
buildings  and  conducting  the  business  of  it  was  to  be 
assumed  by  an  Illinois  corporation  to  be  organized  for 
the  purpose.  This  corporation  was  at  first  known  as 
the  "World's  Exposition  of  1892"  but  was  afterwards 
appropriately  changed  in  name  to  the  "World's 
Columbian  Exposition." 

The  Exposition  Company  was  capitalized  first  at 
$5,000,000  \vhich  represented  the  first  idea  of  cost, 


WORLD'S  COLUMBIAN  EXPOSITION         155 

and  then  increased  to  $10,000,000,  the  project  being 
popularized  by  inviting  subscribers  large  and  small 
from  all  classes  of  citizens,  rich  and  poor,  high  and 
low,  with  the  result  that  there  were  over  30,000  stock- 
holders. Forty-five  of  Chicago's  leading  citizens  were 
named  as  the  original  directors,  my  father  being  one 
of  the  number,  and  Mr.  Lyman  J.  Gage  was  named  as 
the  first  President  of  the  organization.  In  framing 
his  committees,  Mr.  Gage  named  my  father  as  Chair- 
man of  the  committee  on  foreign  exhibits  which  had 
to  do  with  interesting  all  the  nations  of  the  earth  in 
the  exposition,  and  he  also  placed  him  upon  the  im- 
portant committee  on  legislation.  The  work  of  prelimi- 
nary organization  began  and  was  well  under  way 
when  Mr.  Gage  determined  to  resign,  as  his  duties, 
taken  together  with  other  responsibilities  which  he 
could  not  avoid,  overtaxed  his  strength  and  health 
and  made  it  necessary  for  him  to  do  so.  The  directors 
then  focused  their  minds  on  my  father  as  the  man  to 
place  at  the  helm  and  drive  this  tremendous  under- 
taking to  a  successful  finality  and  he  was,  therefore, 
elected  President  of  the  World's  Fair  in  the  spring  of 
1891,  and  at  once  began  his  duties  and  gave  all  his 
time  without  any  compensation  other  than  popular 
approval  of  his  work,  and  so  continued  to  do  as 
long  as  he  served.  In  fact,  it  was  a  labor  of  love  with 
all  the  directors,  most  of  whom  gave  half  their  time 
to  it,  and  none  of  them,  with  but  one  exception,  ever 
accepted  a  cent  of  compensation  from  the  exposition 
company  from  the  beginning  to  the  end. 


156         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

The  corporation  opened  up  its  offices  in  the  begin- 
ning of  the  year  1891  occupying  the  entire  floor 
of  one  of  the  large  down-town  office  buildings, 
and  then  began  the  great  task  of  financing  the 
plan,  erecting  the  buildings  which  were  to  consti- 
tute a  city  in  themselves,  and  interesting  all  the 
nations  of  the  earth  in  sending  exhibits  character- 
istic of  their  respective  countries.  The  ambition 
of  Chicago  was  to  make  it  an  exposition  such  as  had 
never  been  in  the  history  of  the  world.  There  had 
been  fifteen  universal  expositions  preceding  it  in  dif- 
ferent parts  of  the  world  during  the  preceding  forty- 
three  years,  and  the  ambition  of  my  father  and  his 
fellow  directors  was  to  make  this  a  show  that  would 
go  down  through  all  history  as  the  very  quintessence 
of  expositions;  as  one  that  would  overshadow  all 
preceding  ones  in  grandeur  and  magnificence,  and 
discourage  all  future  ones  in  their  attempts  to  rival  it. 
All  this  would  take  much  money  to  accomplish  in 
addition  to  brains  and  unceasing  work.  The  very 
cream  of  Chicago's  citizenship  in  business  and  pro- 
fessional ability  made  up  the  directory,  but  where  to 
get  the  money  in  so  much  larger  amounts  than 
originally  contemplated,  was  indeed  a  serious  ques- 
tion. The  public  spiritedness  of  the  City  of  Chicago 
showed  itself  in  the  City  bonding  itself  for  $5,000,000. 
The  exposition  company  also  bonded  itself  and  its 
gate  receipts  for  another  $5,000,000,  and  Congress 
was  asked  to  appropriate  still  another  $5,000,000.  In 
the  effort  to  get  this  last  appropriation  my  father  was 


WORLD'S  COLUMBIAN  EXPOSITION         157 

unusually  active,  and  he  visited  the  City  of  Washing- 
ton a  great  deal  in  connection  with  securing  Federal 
aid.  Congress  was  not  friendly  to  the  exposition  idea 
and  begrudged  any  aid  that  it  could  give.  It  was 
opposed  to  granting  in  full  the  aid  applied  for,  but 
it  finally  relaxed  to  the  extent  of  giving  the  exposition 
company  $2,500,000  in  silver  half  dollar  coins,  specially 
designed  as  souvenirs  for  commemorating  the  exposi- 
tion year.  While  these  coins  were  a  novelty  at  first 
the  directors  were  able  to  sell  them  for  a  dollar  each, 
and  in  this  way  realized  from  them  considerably  more 
than  the  $2,500,000  which  represented  their  face  value, 
but  as  soon  as  the  fad  wore  off  they  could  only  be 
disposed  of  at  their  face  value. 

Father  was  a  member  of  the  original  budget  com- 
mittee which  had  to  do  with  the  financial  operations 
of  the  fair.  He  had  much  to  do  with  the  work  of 
securing  the  co-operation  of  the  different  States  and 
Nations  in  connection  with  the  exposition.  In  the 
very  beginning  of  the  operations  the  Board  of  Direc- 
tors and  National  Commission  began  to  clash.  The 
commission  which  was  principally  made  up  of  poli- 
ticians, hung  like  a  millstone  around  the  neck  of  the 
exposition  and  did  much  to  retard  it  in  its  early  work. 
It  was  very  eager  to  have  something  to  do  with  the 
spending  of  the  many  millions  of  dollars  in  building 
the  White  City.  Every  one  knew  what  that  would 
mean  and  that  it  would  lead  to  the  failure  to  accom- 
plish results  and  to  undoubted  scandal.  The  direc- 
tors, however,  who  were  business  and  professional 


158         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

men  of  tried  experience  and  known  honor,  did  not  for 
a  moment  contemplate  allowing  the  disbursement  of 
the  money  to  go  out  of  their  hands.  The  subscribers 
of  it  had  placed  it  in  their  hands,  and  they  looked  to 
them  to  spend  it  rightly  and  make  the  exposition  a 
success.  The  relations  of  the  two  bodies  were,  how- 
ever, harmoniously  adjusted  as  soon  as  the  smell  of 
the  money  was  cut  off,  and  it  is  said  that  Father  had 
much  to  do  with  bringing  this  about,  with  the  result 
that  thereafter  the  business  affairs  of  the  exposition 
went  on  quite  smoothly  and  without  interference  from 
the  commission. 

Of  course,  with  the  spending  of  so  much  money 
in  sight,  the  avarice  and  greed  of  different  interests 
which  had  been  excited  by  the  hope  of  being  benefitted, 
had  to  be  met  and  the  interests  of  the  exposition  care- 
fully guarded.  Perhaps  more  on  this  account  than 
any  other  was  Father  selected  as  the  head  of  the  Fair 
as  a  barrier  against  corruption  because  of  his  known 
scrupulousness  and  rigid  honesty. 

One  of  the  first  of  the  many  grafts  which  were  at- 
tempted to  be  levied  was  the  electrical  contract  for 
the  fair,  which  the  General  Electric  Company  hoped 
to  get  at  its  tender  of  $1,800,000  " which  meant  no 
profit  to  them  as  the  bid  only  contemplated  giving 
them  an  advertisement  and  helping  out  the  World's 
Fair  corporation."  Although  my  father  at  the  time 
had  had  little  experience  in  the  cost  of  electrical  appa- 
ratus, his  common  sense  suggested  to  him  that  the 
price  offered  was  unreasonably  high.  An  attempt 


WORLD'S  COLUMBIAN  EXPOSITION         159 

was  made  to  railroad  it  through,  for  certain  directors 
were  also  stockholders  in  the  General  Electric  Com- 
pany, but  my  father  thwarted  this  and  directed  that 
an  investigation  of  other  companies  be  made  for  the 
purpose  of  cutting  down  what  seemed  to  him  to  be 
an  extortionate  appropriation  for  a  single  object.  As 
a  result  of  his  stand  the  General  Electric  Company 
reduced  its  bill  to  the  charitable  sum  of  $554,000. 
Then  Mr.  Westing-house  in  behalf  of  his  company 
issued  his  promise  supported  by  a  very  large  bond, 
that  if  allowed  to  bid,  his  company  would  do  the  same 
work  for  a  sum  less  than  $400,000.  As  a  result  of  all 
this  the  Westinghouse  Company  made  a  tender  of 
$399,000  and  secured  the  contract,  at  which  figure  it 
made  a  slight  profit  in  addition  to  securing  a  very 
great  advertisement. 

The  construction  operations  were,  of  course,  laid 
out  upon  a  very  extensive  scale,  and  the  working  or- 
ganization necessary  for  the  spending  of  so  many 
millions  of  dollars  in  so  short  a  time  in  practically 
building  a  new  city  within  the  space  of  months,  was 
necessarily  one  which  had  to  be  well  thought  out. 
Contracts  had  to  be  let  for  the  construction  of  each 
building,  and  this  had  to  be  done  most  carefully  and 
under  well  considered  specifications.  The  great  archi- 
tectural firms  of  the  country  were  invited  to  furnish 
plans  for  the  several  buildings.  There  was  no  com- 
petitive contest  for  these  honors,  but  the  architects 
were  selected  by  the  directors  from  among  the  best 
and  most  noted  and  they  were  paid  a  liberal  fee  or 


160         LIFE  OJP  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

honorarium  for  such  services,  although  the  honor  of 
doing  the  work  was  considered  their  best  return  for 
the  so  doing. 

The  prairie  waste  where  the  Fair  was  to  be  located 
south  of  Chicago  on  Lake  Michigan  had  to  be  trans- 
formed entirely  with  respect  to  its  landscape  features. 
Great  dredges  were  put  to  work  excavating  artificial 
lakes  and  lagoons,  and  trees  and  shrubbery  were 
planted  under  the  directions  of  the  best  landscape 
engineers  in  the  land,  in  order  to  give  the  fair  grounds 
a  picturesqueness  which  they  otherwise  would  not 
have  had.  Then  Chicago's  dream  began  to  become  a 
reality,  and  the  exposition  finally  loomed  up  in  all  its 
artistic,  enchanting  and  grand  proportions  as  a  new 
landscape,  and  a  new  city  began  to  take  completed 
form  there  out  of  the  original  prairie  waste.  It  is 
now  but  a  memory  of  a  beautiful  vision  beside  the 
Lake. 

Then  came  the  question  of  the  exhibits  to  be  in- 
stalled within  the  several  palaces  which  had  been  pre- 
pared for  their  reception.  The  entire  world  was  can- 
vassed for  this  purpose  by  emissaries  sent  out  on  a 
tour  of  the  different  countries  for  the  purpose  of 
interesting  them  to  their  advantage  in  participating 
in  the  great  work.  All  this  met  with  flattering  suc- 
cess, and  the  nations  came  as  with  one  accord  to  dis- 
play the  best  results  of  their  individual  civilizations. 
Then  the  gates  were  opened  and  the  people  came  in 
armies  from  all  over  the  world,  and  although  the 
country  was  in  a  state  of  panic  and  hard  times,  yet 


1 


u 


WORLD'S  COLUMBIAN  EXPOSITION         161 

the  attendance  was  extraordinarily  large.  Some  of 
the  single  day's  attendance  were  record  breakers,  such 
as  Chicago  Day  which  brought  three-quarters  of  a 
million  people  to  the  fair  grounds.  It  is  evident 
enough  without  emphasizing  the  fact,  that  to  accom- 
plish all  this  meant  an  organization  equal  in  ability 
and  effectiveness  to  any  in  the  land,  and  the  fact  that 
Father  presided  over  it  in  a  manner  entirely  to  his 
credit,  and  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  directors  and  the 
citizens  of  Chicago,  is  a  source  of  great  pride  and 
satisfaction  to  his  friends  and  to  those  who  are  related 
to  him. 

The  Fair  was  dedicated  October  23,  1892,  by  the 
Vice-President  of  the  United  States.  It  was  opened 
to  the  public  on  May  I,  1893,  by  President  Cleveland, 
which  act  was  signalized  by  the  simultaneous  unfurl- 
ing of  the  flags  of  all  nations,  the  starting  of  the  elec- 
tric fountains,  the  dazzle  of  electric  lights,  and  the 
unveiling  of  the  statue  of  the  Republic.  The  total  cost 
of  the  fair  was  $43,000,000  and  it  covered  an  area 
of  one  square  mile,  the  largest  single  building  covering 
thirty-one  acres,  being  large  enough  to  hold  under  its 
roof  the  entire  army  of  Russia.  The  report  of  the 
Congressional  committee  on  the  World's  Fair  con- 
tained this  tribute  to  the  exposition  :— 

"In  its  scope  and  magnificance  the  exposition  stands  alone. 
There  is  nothing  like  it  in  all  history.  It  easily  surpasses  all 
similar  enterprises,  and  will  amply  illustrate  the  marvelous 
genius  of  the  American  people  in  the  great  domains  of  science, 
commerce,  manufactures,  and  invention,  which  constitutes  the 


162        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

foundation  upon  which  rests  the  structure  of  our  national  glory 
and  prosperity." 

Father  served  as  President  throughout  the  year 
1891  and  was  re-elected  for  the  following  year.  The 
transportation  problem  was  perhaps  the  greatest  one 
that  concerned  the  directors  of  the  fair.  How  to 
handle  the  great  crowds  that  the  exposition  would 
attract  to  the  city,  and  how  to  transport  them  safely 
to  and  fro,  was  the  most  vital  question  to  be  settled. 
Whether  Father  was  originally  responsible  for  the 
idea  of  track-raising  to  insure  public  safety,  by  allow- 
ing the  street  thoroughfares  to  go  under  the  rail- 
roads instead  of  crossing  at  grade  does  not  seem  to 
be  known,  but  it  is  quite  certain  that  the  tremendous 
influence  and  energy  which  he  put  behind  the  execu- 
tion of  this  idea  was  responsible  for  its  successful  con- 
summation. The  World's  Fair  Company  donated  to 
the  Illinois  Central  Railroad  over  $200,000,  or  a  sum 
of  money  equal  to  what  it  would  have  had  to  spend  in 
building  bridges  and  viaducts  for  the  traffic  to  cross 
over  and  above  the  railroad  tracks.  With  this  encour- 
agement, the  Illinois  Central  was  inspired  to  raise 
its  entire  roadbed  from  its  city  terminal  to  the  out- 
skirts of  the  city.  This  served  the  purpose  of  the  fair, 
but  the  object  lesson  which  it  gave  was  of  more  far- 
reaching  influence  still,  for  it  resulted  later  in  all  the 
railroads  coming  into  Chicago  being  compelled  to  like- 
wise raise  their  tracks  at  their  own  expense.  This 
was  the  theme  in  connection  with  the  exposition  work 
that  Father  talked  most  about,  and  the  one  in  which 


WORLD'S  COLUMBIAN  EXPOSITION         163 

his  heart  was  more  firmly  set,  and  its  accomplishment 
has  proved  a  great  and  permanent  blessing  to  the  City 
of  Chicago. 

The  terrible  strain  of  so  herculean  a  task,  together 
with  the  worries  incidental  to  an  invalid  wife,  caused 
Father  to  break  down  in  health  in  the  summer  of  1892. 
He  therefore  went  abroad  with  his  family  for  the 
purpose  of  rest  and  recuperation,  but  finding  that  he 
did  not  mend  as  rapidly  as  he  had  hoped,  and  feeling 
that  the  success  of  the  exposition  would  be  jeopardized 
by  his  absence  from  the  scene  of  operations,  he  felt 
constrained  in  the  fall  of  1892  to  resign  the  Presi- 
dency, which  he  did  while  in  Europe.  This  was 
reluctantly  accepted  by  the  directory,  and  thereafter 
his  work  in  connection  with  the  fair  was  less  exacting 
than  it  had  been  before,  although  he  still  remained  a 
director.  The  great  task  of  blocking  out  the  edifice 
in  the  rough  having  been  completed,  the  direction  of 
the  work  thereafter,  and  the  finishing  touches  went  on 
in  other  hands. 


CHAPTER  VII 
THE  CIVIC  FEDERATION 

1895-1897 

WHEN  public  plundering  became  so  rampant 
in  Chicago  and  political  morality  reached  the 
low  ebb  which  it  did  in  the  early  9o's,  it  was 
only  natural  that  a  distressed  and  exasperated  people 
should  take  measures  to  provide  an  antidote  and  cor- 
rective. Thus  there  gathered  together  from  time  to 
time,  meetings  of  outraged  citizens,  with  the  final  re- 
sult that  they  formed  themselves  together  into  an 
organization  and  styled  it  the  Civic  Federation.  The 
association  had  for  its  object  the  purifying  of  city 
politics,  the  securing  of  efficient  administration  of 
civic  affairs,  the  suppression  of  vice,  and  the  improve- 
ment of  public  morality,  the  institution  of  charities, 
and  the  furtherance  and  betterment  of  industrial  and 
educational  conditions.  Evidently  the  organization 
took  upon  its  shoulders  a  herculean  task.  It  was 
officered  by  public  spirited  citizens  possessed  of  the 
courage  of  their  convictions,  the  love  of  country,  and 
unselfish  devotion  to  a  most  righteous  cause.  These 
men  gave  their  time  from  their  business  and  other 
affairs  without  any  compensation  whatever,  but  what 
they  have  done  has  left  its  lasting  impress  upon  the 
character  of  Chicago  as  a  city,  for  which  posterity 


166         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

will  be  grateful.  The  association  divided  its  work 
into  six  departments,  presided  over  by  six  standing 
committees  appointed  from  the  membership  of  the 
organization.  These  departments  were  known  as  the 
Political,  Municipal,  Philanthropic,  Morals,  Indus- 
trial, and  Educational  Departments.  As  an  offshoot 
from  this  organization  has  grown  the  National  Civic 
Federation,  with  headquarters  in  New  York  City, 
having  the  same  general  purposes,  but  wider  in  its 
scope,  so  as  to  include  situations  national  in  aspect. 

My  father  was  one  of  the  few  men  who  originally 
got  together  and  crystalized  this  movement  for  bet- 
ter conditions,  into  the  working  organization  which 
has  been  described.  As  the  first  President  of  it,  Mr. 
Lyman  J.  Gage  directed  its  affairs  in  the  beginning. 
At  the  end  of  the  first  year  he  was  succeeded  in  office 
by  my  father,  who  served  as  President  during  the 
years  1895,  1896,  and  1897,  resigning  from  the  office 
during  the  latter  part  of  his  last  year  on  account  of 
poor  health  and  failing  strength,  for  he  was  at  the 
same  time  burdened  with  the  Board  of  Trade  presi- 
dency. The  period  of  his  administration  was  marked 
by  brilliant  achievements  which  have  become  a  part  of 
the  best  history  of  Chicago.  It  took  a  man  of  nerve 
and  physical  courage  to  be  at  the  head  of  an  organi- 
zation of  this  character  and  direct  its  movements,  and 
in  casting  about  for  such  a  man  his  fellow  associates 
made  no  mistake  in  lighting  upon  my  father.  Fight- 
ing, to  him  was  second  nature,  and  carried  with  it  a 
genuine  pleasure,  but  fighting  for  principles  as  he 


THE  CIVIC  FEDERATION  167 

always  did,  inspired  him  to  efficient  action  to  a  degree 
more  than  is  common  among  men. 

To  tell  all  that  this  association  accomplished 
for  the  public  good  under  his  leadership  during 
these  three  years  would  mean  to  write  a  separate 
book  upon  the  subject.  Contemporaneously  with 
his  duties  in  connection  with  this  association,  he 
was  serving  as  President  of  the  Board  of  Trade, 
and  the  great  fight  he  was  conducting  in  behalf 
of  the  latter  organization  against  the  iniquitous 
bucket-shops  of  Chicago  was  taken  up  through  the 
Civic  Federation  as  well.  The  joint  fight  through 
the  two  organizations  resulted  in  the  practical 
extinguishment  of  the  bucket-shop  plague  in  Chicago 
and  was  so  far-reaching  in  its  effects,  as  to 
strike  deadly  blows  to  the  same  industry  in  other 
cities.  In  fact  in  this  feature  of  its  work  the  Civic 
Federation's  operations  extended  into  Iowa,  New 
York  City  and  other  parts  of  the  country.  The  Civic 
Federation  had  at  its  command  a  well  organized 
secret  service,  so  that  it  never  struck  a  blow  without 
being  provided  with  full  ammunition.  Upon  the  in- 
formation obtained  through  this  service  there  were 
281  bucket-shop  persons  indited  at  one  time.  Six 
Skekle  bucket-shops  were  raided  by  the  Chicago 
police  under  the  direction  of  the  Federation  and  350 
people  were  arrested.  When  brought  before  the 
courts  to  plead  to  the  charges  preferred  against  them, 
many  of  them  gave  fictitious  names  for  the  purpose  of 
indicating  how  indifferent  they  were  to  the  crusade 


168         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

against  them.  Among  the  names  given  by  some  of 
the  prisoners  were  William  T.  Baker,  William  Mc- 
Kinley  and  Lyman  J.  Gage. 

Father  next  directed  his  guns  against  the  gambling 
element  of  Chicago,  and  particularly  against  the  pool 
rooms  and  the  Westside  Racetrack.  Fortunately  for 
the  purposes  of  the  Federation  and  the  good  of  the 
city,  Chief  of  Police  Badenoch  was  a  good  citizen  and 
friendly  to  the  purposes  of  the  Federation,  and  be- 
cause of  this  fact  the  Federation  was  enabled  to  do 
much  more  effective  work  than  would  have  been  pos- 
sible otherwise.  The  Federation  discovered  the  in- 
iquitous and  vicious  situations,  planned  the  mode  of 
attack,  and  Chief  Badenoch  would  lead  the  charge. 
In  this  way  seven  pool  rooms  were  raided  at  one 
time  and  five  hundred  people  taken  prisoners.  Gam- 
bling in  this  way  was  practically  driven  out  of  Chi- 
cago, for  without  protection  from  the  police  it  could 
not  thrive.  This  protection  was  lacking,  due  largely 
to  the  influence  of  the  Federation  in  securing  the  ap- 
pointment of  honest  and  effective  patrolmen.  The 
warfare  upon  the  gamblers  completely  demoralized 
their  business  and  made  their  calling  so  unattractive 
that  they  quit  business  or  moved  to  other  cities.  Some 
of  them  felt  that  they  had  as  much  right  to  thrive  in 
their  line  of  business  as  other  people  did  in  their  busi- 
ness, and  they  felt  that  Father  and  his  lieutenants 
were  unrighteously  serving  in  the  role  of  persecutors 
of  them.  As  a  result  of  this  feeling  upon  their  part, 
the  gamblers  brought  damage  suits  against  Father 


THE  CIVIC  FEDERATION  169 

for  large  amounts,  aggregating  over  a  quarter  of  a 
million  dollars,  but  it  is  needless  to  say  that  these 
suits  never  came  to  a  hearing.  Some  of  the  gamblers 
would  change  their  names  and  the  outward  style  of 
their  business  and  attempt  to  live  again  but  without 
success.  The  McClure  den  was  one  of  the  most  per- 
sistent in  this  manner  but  finally  gave  up  the  ghost. 
The  Federation  took  a  look  in  on  Grand  Jury 
methods  and  found  that  many  of  its  members  were 
soliciting  bribes,  and  as  a  result  they  got  their  punish- 
ment. The  Civil  Service  Commissioners  were  indicted 
for  irregular  conduct  in  office.  These  Commissioners 
were  Dudley  Winston,  Hempstead  Washburn  and 
Adolph  Klaus.  Without  fear  or  favor  the  Federation 
struck  its  blows.  One  of  the  Commissioners,  Mr. 
Klaus,  grew  humorous  and  circulated  the  following 
verse  of  his  own  composition: 

"Paddy  cake,  paddy  cake  Baker  man, 
Make  us  indited  as  fast  as  you  can, 
Make  them  and  mark  them  with  W.  T., 
And  fire  them  at  Dudley  and  Hempy  and  me." 

In  the  Political  Department,  the  Federation  in 'sup- 
port of  the  Crawford  Primary  Election  Law  began 
prosecutions  for  violations  of  the  same.  In  this  con- 
nection they  sent  abstracts  of  the  law  to  4,500  judges 
and  clerks,  giving  notice  that  violators  would  be 
prosecuted.  Evidence  was  secured  against  a  large 
number  and  indictments  obtained. 

For  the  purpose  of  securing  good  men  in  office  and 
the  prevention  of  boodle  associations,  there  was  or- 


170         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

ganized  the  Municipal  Voters  League,  which  co-oper- 
ated with  the  Civic  Federation  and  other  reform  or- 
ganizations. In  this  way  it  was  discovered  that 
through  fraud  and  intimidation  and  other  tactics  of 
desperate  men,  the  good  work  of  the  Federation  was 
about  to  be  defeated  at  the  coming  elections.  This 
was  thwarted  by  the  discovery  of  illegal  registrations 
and  false  naturalizations  to  a  wholesale  extent.  Re- 
wards of  $100  were  offered  throughout  the  city  for 
evidence  sufficient  to  convict  people  of  illegal  voting. 
All  evidence  of  prospective  crimes  in  this  direction 
were  immediately  published  broadcast,  and  the  judges 
and  clerks  of  the  election  were  carefully  selected  after 
the  closest  scrutiny,  with  the  general  result  that  the 
election  was  saved  and  good  men  conducted  into  office. 
The  Federation  through  its  Municipal  Department 
was  instrumental  in  securing  a  just  and  equitable  as- 
sessment of  property  so  that  taxation  might  be  placed 
where  it  belonged,  allowing  no  favored  interests  to 
escape  from  bearing  their  share  of  the  city's  burdens. 
The  consolidation  of  the  various  towns  around  Chi- 
cago, such  as  Hyde  Park,  Englewood  and  others,  was 
put  under  way  by  the  Federation.  One  of  the  most 
practical  benefits  which  the  Federation  was  able  to 
secure  for  the  city  in  all  its  history  was  to  demonstrate 
that  the  street  cleaning  department  was  extravagant 
and  that  this  work  could  be  better  done  for  half  what 
the  city  was  paying.  A  street  cleaning  bureau  was 
organized,  which  investigated  street  cleaning  in 
neighboring  cities  with  a  showing  that  $8.50  per  mile 


THE  CIVIC  FEDERATION  171 

was  all  the  work  was  worth,  although  Chicago  had 
been  paying  $18.50.  The  Federation  secured  private 
subscriptions  along  the  principal  down  town  streets, 
and  through  its  bureau  organized  for  the  pur- 
pose, actually  did  the  work  for  $10  per  mile.  The 
result  of  this  was  that  when  bids  were  next  opened 
by  the  Commissioner  of  Public  Works,  the  lowest  bid 
was  $8.40  per  mile,  while  the  highest  was  only  $9.99, 
and  this  was  tendered  by  the  firm  which  the  previous 
year  had  been  getting  $18.50. 

A  sanitary  inspection  service  was  organized  which 
watched  with  eagle  eye  the  garbage  contractors  of  the 
city  and  the  inspectors  employed  by  the  city  who 
supervised  the  work.  The  investigation  also  ex- 
tended to  the  milk  supply,  the  ice  and  water  supply, 
fruit  stands,  &c.,  and  many  other  things  effecting  the 
public  health  and  cleanliness.  The  Federation  made 
it  difficult  for  the  granting  of  public  franchises  with- 
out compensation  to  the  city.  It  also  discovered  that 
the  packing  houses  at  the  stockyards  had  tapped  the 
city  water  mains  and  were  stealing  water  for  the  pur- 
pose of  running  their  factories,  which  illicit  use  of 
water  had  probably  been  going  on  for  years.  It  was 
impossible  to  jail  any  for  this  offense  as  the  guilt 
could  not  be  laid  at  any  particular  door,  and  innocence 
of  evil  intent  was  claimed  by  the  offenders.  However, 
the  Federation  made  it  impossible  for  them  to  do  the 
thing  again.  The  Federation  organized  the  Bureau 
of  Charities,  with  Father  as  Vice-President,  and  this 
is  the  predominating  charity  organization  in  Chicago 


172         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

today.  It  has  for  its  object  the  bringing  of  all  the 
different  charity  organizations  of  the  city  into  co- 
operation in  order  to  examine  into  conditions  of  real 
and  legitimate  want,  and  to  bring  thoughtful  persons 
individually  into  personal  and  friendly  communica- 
tion with  families  in  need.  Its  work  has  resulted  in 
young  children  being  kept  off  the  streets  at  night  and 
given  an  opportunity  to  go  to  school,  and  beggars 
have  been  found  employment.  The  Federation's  war- 
fare was  directed  against  slot  machines,  and  it  did 
much  under  Father's  leadership  in  establishing  purity, 
by  the  restriction  of  vice,  and  the  securing  of  employ- 
ment and  good  homes  for  evil  doers.  It  did  much  dur- 
ing his  administration  towards  adjusting  strikes  by 
urging  arbitration,  and  towards  the  solution  of  the 
child  labor  problem.  It  has  secured  better  practice  in 
the  heating  and  ventilation  of  school  buildings,  the 
qualification  of  teachers,  and  the  safety  of  pupils. 

The  Federation  inaugurated  branch  offices  in 
twenty-five  wards,  each  taking  up  in  its  own  district 
the  important  reform  measures  promulgated  by  the 
parent  organization  over  which  my  father  presided. 
At  the  time  of  his  introduction  to  the  office  three- 
fourths  of  the  common  council  of  the  city  were  thieves, 
known  as  "Grafters  and  gray  wolves,"  and  such  had 
been  the  situation  for  the  three  or  four  years  prior. 
It  is  now  safe  to  say  that  seventy-five  per  cent  of  the 
Chicago  City  councilmen  are  capable,  reliable  and 
honest  men.  In  fact,  it  has  today  the  best  council  of 
any  large  city  in  the  United  States,  and  the  Feder- 


THE  CIVIC  FEDERATION  173 

ation,  and  those  who  worked  for  it,  have  ample  reason 
to  be  proud  of  what  they  were  the  means  of  bringing 
about.  It  is  not  to  be  wondered  at  therefore,  in  view 
of  the  drastic  house-cleaning  which  was  going  on 
throughout  the  city,  that  my  father  became  the  target 
for  abuse  and  hatred  among  the  criminal  and  the  law- 
less element.  Many  times  did  he  receive  anonymous 
letters  through  the  mails,  stating  that  he  would  be 
assassinated  if  he  did  not  let  up  in  the  warfare  which 
he  was  engineering,  and  many  times  he  was  followed 
by  persons  with  evil  intent  when  walking  alone  at  a 
late  hour;  but  all  this  had  as  much  effect  upon  his 
determination  to  follow  his  convictions  and  to  do  his 
duty  as  he  saw  it,  as  a  baby's  breath  would  have  had 
in  attempting  to  blow  out  the  Chicago  fire. 


w  i-- 

S   (M 

s   . 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

SNOQUALMIE  FALLS   AND  WHITE   RIVER 
POWER  DEVELOPMENTS. 
1887-1904. 

I. 

AS  my  father  entered  upon  the  later  years  of  his 
life,  he  began  to  have  a  joy  and  pride  in  his 
children,  which  earlier  in  their  lives  he  did  not 
display  to  so  great  a  degree,  for  like  most  natures, 
his  mellowed  with  the  years  and  as  his  children  grew 
up.  He  looked  upon  his  children  as  a  business  propo- 
sition. Towards  them  he  had  always  been  exacting 
and  severe.  He  was  as  sparing  of  his  personal  en- 
dorsement of  their  capabilities  as  he  was  of  his 
financial  assistance  to  them.  In  our  early  life  we 
looked  upon  him  as  a  hard  master.  We  did  not  get 
the  inspiration  from  him  that  we  would  have  done 
had  he  leaned  a  little  closer,  so  we  often  got  dis- 
couraged in  the  hope  of  pleasing  him.  But  that  was 
his  way,  and  it  was  perhaps  for  the  good  of  us.  When 
my  brother  Howard  and  I  were  attending  Cornell 
University  we  were  not  restricted  by  him  in  the  least 
in  the  quality  of  board,  our  dress,  or  in  the  essentials. 
We  were  required  to  schedule  our  requirements  in 
detail  each  month  in  advance,  to  which  list  of  necessi- 


176         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

ties  we  were  allowed  to  add  two  dollars  and  a  half, 
"pocket  money"  for  each  of  us.  This  seems  a  frugal 
pocket  money  allowance  for  the  sons  of  a  wealthy 
man.  Our  entire  allowance  for  the  whole  four  years 
for  board,  tuition,  fraternity  dues,  and  the  essentials, 
including  traveling  expenses  twice  a  year  each  way 
between  Chicago  and  Ithaca,  New  York,  was  less  than 
$600.00  a  year  for  each.  He  was  in  no  sense  mean 
nor  stingy,  but  he  did  what  he  thought  best  for  his 
children;  and  as  a  result  he  has  no  spoiled  sons  to 
blush  for.  When  we  finished  college,  we  each  wanted 
a  job.  I  asked  him  to  give  me  letters  to  some  of  his 
railroad  friends  so  I  could  get  started  in  some  rail- 
road engineering  corps.  He  said,  "He  couldn't  do 
that, — he  never  endorsed  anyone  without  knowing 
something  of  his  abilities,  etc.,  and  in  that  regard, 
I  was  quite  a  stranger  to  him."  So  it  happened  that 
having  an  illustrious  father  at  that  time  was  no  help 
at  all  to  an  ambitious  son,  for  it  looked  to  a  man  up 
a  tree,  as  though  this  father's  failure  to  recommend 
was  due  to  the  having  of  a  black  sheep  for  a  son. 
But  again  I  say,  that  was  his  way  and  he  acted  as  he 
believed  right.  No  one  gave  him  money  nor  pushed 
him  ahead  when  he  was  a  boy  and  it  did  not  hurt  him, 
— so  why  should  it  hurt  us,  he  reasoned.  He  was 
particularly  conscientious  in  the  dispensation  of  any 
patronage  or  favors  within  his  command  to  members 
of  his  family.  As  President  of  the  Chicago  World's 
Fair  he  commanded  a  great  deal  of  patronage  in  the 
shape  of  very  attractive  and  lucrative  positions  which 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  177 

were  his  to  give,  but  none  such  were  ever  offered  to 
his  sons,  who  would  doubtless  during  the  hard  times 
at  that  time  have  been  glad  to  have  them;  and  they 
knew  him  too  well  to  ask  for  any  such  official  consid- 
eration by  virtue  of  filial  relation.  It  was  one  of  the 
set  maxims  of  his  life  to  treat  patronage  in  this  way, 
and  he  often  criticized  public  men  for  violating  his 
ideas  of  etiquette  in  such  matters  by  injecting  their 
relations  into  positions  of  official  favor. 

As  he  began  to  withdraw  gradually  from  public  life 
and  from  the  activities  of  business  during  his  later 
years,  he  relaxed  more  and  more  in  favor  of  his  chil- 
dren, and  gave  them  a  helping  hand.  This  he  had 
done  at  times  previously,  in  the  way  of  making  them 
small  loans  and  exacting  prompt  payment  of  the  same, 
just  as  he  would  from  strangers,  but  he  was  always 
looking  forward  to  the  time  when  we  would  be  sea- 
soned and  tried  by  experience,  so  that  then  he  might 
stand  behind  us,  not  only  as  a  father  but  as  a  banker, 
after  he  deemed  our  fitness  for  such  confidence  fully 
demonstrated. 

And  so  the  time  came  after  we  had  been  upon  our 
own  resources  and  independent  of  him  for  a  period 
of  about  ten  years,  when  he  backed  his  son  Howard 
in  the  purchase  of  a  considerable  interest  in  Butler 
Brothers'  establishment  whose  position  in  that  firm 
I  had  previously  secured  for  him.  His  letters  to  me 
indicated  an  intention  later  on  of  backing  his  son-in-law 
in  the  contracting  business,  and  he  was  also  disposed 
to  back  his  son  Henry  in  a  newspaper  enterprise,  as 


178         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

soon  as  an  associate  might  be  found  to  invest  in  it 
and  take  the  business  end,  while  Henry  would  take 
the  literary  end.  For  Bertha,  his  daughter,  he  in- 
sured his  life  for  $50,000  which  is  now  being  paid 
to  her  in  an  annuity.  But  his  most  signal  favor  fell 
upon  me  at  the  age  of  thirty-four,  and  the  result  of  it 
has  .since  shown  that  his  confidence  and  judgment 
were  not  misplaced. 

Now  comes  the  period  in  his  history  when  for  five 
years,  although  we  were  nearly  two  thousand  miles 
apart,  his  daily  life  was  closely  interwoven  with  my 
own,  in  the  carrying  out  of  the  great  engineering  and 
construction  enterprises  of  harnessing  the  falls  of  the 
Snoqualmie  River  and  the  rapids  of  the  White  River 
in  the  State  of  Washington,  and  transmitting  the 
power  thereof  electrically  to  Seattle,  Tacoma  and 
Everett,  and  the  intervening  towns.  He  really  knew 
this  work  only  as  it  was  reflected  through  my  daily 
letters  to  him,  for  by  actual  visitation  he  has  only  seen 
the  Snoqualmie  project  three  times  in  his  life,  and 
then  for  about  an  hour  each  time,  while  White  River 
he  never  saw  at  all.  He  was  quick  to  grasp  the  mean- 
ing of  the  engineering  plans  as  I  explained  them  to 
him,  and  the  progress  of  the  physical  construction 
from  day  to  day  as  I  reported  it  to  him  was  clear  to 
his  mind.  He  saw  it  not  only  with  the  eye  of  a  shrewd 
business  man,  but  with  the  eye  of  an  engineer,  for  by 
nature  he  was  designed  for  such.  I  venture  to  say 
that  he  took  more  genuine  interest  in  my  work  in  de- 
veloping these  enterprises,  than  he  ever  took  in  any 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  179 

work  of  his  own,  except  possibly  the  World's  Fair. 
He  took  an  unconcealed  pride  in  what  I  was  under- 
taking to  do  and  was  actually  accomplishing,  and  he 
made  it  almost  the  daily  topic  of  conversation  between 
himself  and  his  friends  when  they  chanced  to  meet  at 
lunch  or  at  other  places.  He  would  tell  them  "Charley 
is  accomplishing  a  great  undertaking  out  there  in  the 
Puget  Sound  country  and  is  going  to  make  his  for- 
tune and  fame  out  of  it  and  mine  too,  besides  doing 
a  public  good.  I  am  with  him  financially  and  I  know 
he  will  succeed,  although  the  difficulties  before  him  are 
very  great  and  he  has  a  big  fight  on  his  hands  be- 
sides." "We  are  actually  taking  the  waste  of  nature," 
he  would  say,  "and  making  useful  and  valuable  power 
out  of  it,  and  bringing  it  down  to  the  cities,  and  sell- 
ing it  to  the  people  for  much  less  than  such  power 
costs  them  by  any  other  method,  and  they  are  glad  to 
get  it.  That's  business !"  He  felt  that  we  were  doing 
an  integral  part  of  the  world  building,  and  as  he  had 
always  been  a  trader  before,  having  only  had  to  do 
with  property  already  created,  he  felt  that  this  was 
different  and  better,  in  that  we  were  actually  creating 
property  and  adding  to  the  wealth  of  society  thereby. 
This  is  how  we  happened  to  get  together  on  this 
undertaking  and  finally  to  accomplish  it;  and  telling 
it  as  a  part  of  his  life,  I  must  of  necessity  tell  it  as 
the  best  part  of  my  own.  By  education  and  profession 
1  am  a  civil  engineer,  and  have  always  since  my 
graduation  from  college  been  identified  with  large 
works  and  undertakings  of  an  engineering  and  con- 


180         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

structional  character.  I  went  to  Seattle  in  1887  and 
joined  the  engineering  staff  of  a  railroad  there,  which 
was  building  northward  from  Seattle  to  the  Canadian 
boundary  and  eastward  across  the  Cascade  Mountains 
to  Spokane.  This  latter  line  passed  within  fifty  feet 
of  the  great  Snoqualmie  Falls  cataract,  which  at  that 
time  had  no  commercial  value,  and  was  only  thought 
of  as  a  place  of  resort  for  fishermen,  tourists,  and 
campers.  In  the  performance  of  my  particular  duties 
there  was  hardly  a  week  passed  that  I  did  not  see 
this  wasting  waterfall;  and  it  came  into  my  mind  at 
that  early  time  when  I  was  still  only  a  boy,  that  some 
day  it  would  be,  or  ought  to  be,  a  useful  agency  as 
an  industrial  factor,  and  that  its  power  would 
eventually  be  carried  to  the  distant  cities  for  utiliza- 
tion there.  Then  the  daring  hope  sprang  up  in  my 
breast — the  hope  that  I  might  in  some  degree  at  least 
— work  it  out !  Long  distance  electrical  transmission 
of  power  at  that  time  was  more  a  theory  than  a  prac- 
tice, owing  to  the  fact  that  the  transformer  for  raising 
to  high  voltages  for  transmission  and  lowering  to 
low  voltages  for  distribution  had  not  yet  been  per- 
fected. The  power  project  developed  more  and  more 
in  my  mind  however,  expanding  from  the  first  thought 
of  harnessing  the  cataract  for  near  at  hand  uses  only, 
until,  as  the  science  of  transmission  developed,  my 
idea  expanded  accordingly,  so  that  in  a  few  years  I 
had  conceived  a  well  defined  plan  for  utilizing  the 
power  of  Snoqualmie  Falls  and  transmitting  it  to 
Seattle  for  industrial  and  illuminating  purposes. 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  181 

I  realized,  however,  that  such  a  project  could  not 
be  undertaken  with  success  unless  the  commercial  sit- 
uation warranted  it  as  a  business  measure,  and  so 
I  set  about  planning  to  provide  a  market  for  the  power 
as  soon  as  it  could  be  delivered.  For  this  market  I 
looked  to  Seattle,  and  in  looking  that  far,  a  distance  of 
thirty-two  miles,  it  seemed  a  chimerical  and  uncertain 
task,  and  to  say  the  least  bold.  Seattle  then  was  not 
in  a  large  sense  a  manufacturing  or  industrial  city, 
except  in  the  way  of  saw  mills,  which  were  scattered 
about  more  or  less,  and  which  used  their  waste  for 
power  producing  fuel.  There  were  at  that  time 
(1889)  certain  street  car  lines  in  Seattle,  and  an  elec- 
tric light  plant  called  the  Home  (afterwards  Union) 
Electric  Co.,  of  which  I  was  one  of  the  original  organ- 
izers, all  having  independent  steam  power  plants; — 
and  these  I  looked  upon  as  the  prospective  market. 
They  were  owned  by  different  companies,  and  al- 
though there  did  not  seem  to  be  enough  even  of  this 
business  to  make  success  an  assured  thing,  yet  the 
matter  still  nursed  itself  in  my  mind  for  a  number  of 
years.  The  population  was  about  10,000  people  then 
when  I  first  considered  the  matter  as  against  240,000 
at  present. 

In  the  meantime,  on  account  of  the  attractive  pros- 
pects offering  in  a  private  engineering  practice  due  to 
the  city's  rapid  growth,  I  had  resigned  from  the  rail- 
road company  and  took  work  outside,  which  resulted 
in  my  earnings  immediately  trebling  and  later  increas- 
ing even  more  rapidly,  all  of  which  I  profitably  in- 


182         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

vested  in  Seattle  real  estate.  From  this,  I  gradually 
drifted  into  electrical  and  general  construction  work 
as  an  engineer  and  contractor, — in  which  I  was  suc- 
cessful. Finally  in  1891  I  built  by  contract  the  Third 
Street  and  Suburban  Electric  Railway  in  Seattle,  and 
an  electric  light  plant  in  connection  therewith  for  the 
Dennys,  then  considered  the  wealthiest  people  in  that 
city.  The  work  was  done  for  considerably  less  than 
my  estimate  and  should  have'  given  me  a  profit  of 
about  eighteen  thousand  dollars.  On  the  eve  of  the 
completion  of  this  contract  however,  the  Dennys 
failed,  due  to  their  inability  to  refund  their  obligations. 
I  had  borrowed  large  sums  of  money  to  carry  out  the 
contract,  hypothecating  my  estate  for  this  purpose  as 
well  as  the  Denny  securities  which  had  come  to  me 
through  my  contract,  so  that  I  became  involved  with 
the  Dennys  and  went  down  with  them,  resulting  in  the 
sweeping  away  of  my  first  fortune  of  my  own  accumu- 
lation amounting  to  about  forty  thousand  dollars,  and 
leaving  me  indebted  about  sixty  thousand  dollars  be- 
sides. This  situation  was  made  more  particularly 
aggravating  on  account  of  my  losing  my  lien  upon  the 
railroad  property,  due  to  some  technicality  in  the  law. 
Then  began  a  period  of  great  distress  for  me,  for 
contemporaneously  with  this  catastrophe  came  the 
general  panic  of  1893,  and  no  section  of  the  land  felt 
the  distresses  of  that  situation  quite  so  much  as  did 
the  Puget  Sound  country.  People  were  idle  and  going 
hungry.  No  one  escaped.  Claims  in  connection  with 
the  railroad  contract  amounting  to  over  sixty  thou- 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  183 

sand  dollars  were  put  in  judgment  against  me  as  the 
result  of  the  Denny  failure,  and  under  this  deluge  I 
had  to  carry  myself  for  a  number  of  years.  There 
was  no  work  going  on  and  practically  no  employment 
for  any  one.  It  was  a  hand-to-mouth  process  for  all. 
Rich  men  were  land  poor.  The  clothing  of  all  was 
threadbare  and  frilled  at  the  edges.  Mine  especially 
was  so,  and  I  stayed  at  home  and  worked  in  a  garden 
most  of  the  time  so  as  to  hide  my  poverty.  My  father 
knew  but  little  of  all  this  for  I  was  too  proud  to  tell 
him.  There  were  fifty  applicants  for  every  job,  both 
private  and  political.  I  was  always  in  line  with  the 
fifty,  and  always  just  missed  being  chosen.  I  bid  on 
several  pieces  of  work,  and  always  just  missed — for- 
tunately perhaps  for  me,  as  in  those  distressful  days 
the  successful  bidder  in  his  extreme  anxiety  to  get 
work,  usually  bid  so  low  that  he  afterwards  went 
broke.  I  missed  the  U.  S.  Dry  Dock  at  Port  Orchard 
Bay  on  Puget  Sound  by  only  $15.00  by  bidding  $509,- 

000  instead  of  $508,985,  which  was  the  successful  bid. 

1  was  actively  and  for  over  a  year  the  leading  candi- 
date for  postmaster  at  Seattle,  but  failed  at  the  last 
moment  because  of  the  Postmaster  General  at  Wash- 
ington resigning  and  being  succeeded  by  one  who 
happened  to  be  an  old  time  Civil  War  crony  of  one  of 
the  candidates,  who  locally  at  least  was  considered  the 
most  unfit  of  any  of  the  fourteen  aspirants,  and  until 
then  supposed  to  be  the  least  likely. 

I  finally  became  receiver  of  the  Merchants  National 
Bank,  which  was  the  only  bank  in  Seattle  that  failed, 


184         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

and  this  was  the  first  symptom  of  a  clear  sky  that 
had  come  into  my  career  for  some  years.  I  was  ap- 
pointed by  Hon.  Jas.  H.  Eckels,  Comptroller  of  Cur- 
rency upon  the  endorsement  of  Seattle's  leading  citi- 
zens, there  being  twenty-eight  other  candidates 
equally  shabby,  starved  and  clamorous.  With  this 
breathing  spell  ahead  of  me  and  a  chance  to  live  and 
think,  I  then  set  myself  about  studying  out  an  escape 
from  under  the  mountain  of  debt  that  was  holding 
me  down.  I  knew  that  it  was  not  within  my  limita- 
tions to  earn  at  any  scale  of  salary  a  sum  sufficient  to 
extricate  myself  during  any  ordinary  lifetime,  and  to 
assure  at  the  same  time  a  comfortable  future  for  my- 
self and  family.  I  knew  that  the  accomplishment  of 
such  a  herculean  task  would  have  to  be  by  a  master 
stroke  of  some  sort,  and  I  looked  therefore  to  find 
within  me  such  genius,  if  any  existed,  as  would  be 
necessary  to  accomplish  it. 

My  thoughts  then  turned  back  again  to  the  earlier 
dreams  of  Snoqualmie,  which  had  been  less  active  in 
my  mind  during  the  period  of  the  panic.  I  took  the 
matter  up  again  as  actively  as  I  could  from  time  to 
time  consistently  with  my  duties  to  the  bank  receiver- 
ship. There  were  at  this  time  ten  street  railway  com- 
panies operating  in  Seattle,  and  three  electric  light 
companies.  None  of  them  earned  their  expenses,  and 
it  seemed  almost  an  impossible  task  to  approach  them 
along  the  lines  of  selling  them  cheaper  power  at  the 
expense  of  abandoning  their  steam  plants  and  buying 
new  electrical  installations  suitable  for  adaptation  to 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  185 

the  proposed  power  transmission  plant.  They  were 
hard  up,  and  could  not  afford  such  investments,  and 
most  of  them  too  were  in  the  hands  of  receivers. 
There  then  crystalized  in  my  mind  a  comprehensive, 
economical,  well  denned  and  reasonable  plan  for  buy- 
ing up  and  consolidating  all  the  street  railway  systems 
in  Seattle  into  one  company,  under  one  management 
and  having  one  source  of  power,  thereby  eliminating 
the  wasteful  expense  due  to  maintaining  numerous 
managing  organizations,  and  a  multiplicity  of  power 
stations  consuming  expensive  fuel  and  employing 
many  men.  I  attacked  the  problem  of  consolidation 
as  the  solution  of  my  pet  scheme  for  developing  the 
water  power  of  Snoqualmie  Falls.  I  not  only  made 
my  own  plans  and  estimates  concerning  the  proposed 
enterprise  of  the  water  power  development  and  its  pro- 
posed feeder  the  street  railway  and  lighting  combina- 
tion, but  I  secured  corroborative  estimates  from  other 
engineers  as  well.  To  carry  out  my  purposes  I  made 
the  consolidation  my  primary  object,  and  the  water 
power  the  secondary  one.  In  1895  I  made  a  very  com- 
plete and  exhaustive  study  of  the  street  railway  and 
power  situation.  The  books,  records,  and  other  facili- 
ties of  all  the  companies  were  freely  accorded  to  me 
for  my  purpose,  and  as  a  result  I  obtained  not  only  an 
option  on  the  Snoqualmie  Falls,  but  upon  all  the  rail- 
way properties  in  Seattle  except  one, — the  Second 
Street  Road,  which  was  controlled  by  N.  W.  Harris 
&  Co.,  of  Chicago,  who  refused.  These  options  were 
taken  in  my  name  in  contract  form  in  writing,  and  I 


186         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

then  went  East  for  the  purpose  of  financing  the  con- 
solidation. I  negotiated  with  several  banking  firms, 
and  more  particularly  with  Mason,  Lewis  &  Co.,  of 
Chicago,  who  agreed  to  undertake  the  underwriting 
provided  the  situation  could  be  given  to  them  in 
blanket  form,  i.  e.,  all  roads  to  be  included. 

I  returned  to  Seattle  and  made  another  attempt  to 
get  the  Second  Street  Road  in  line,  but  was  frustrated 
in  this  purpose  by  Mr.  S.  Z.  Mitchell,  local  manager 
of  the  General  Electric  Co.,  which  company  as  well 
as  Harris  &  Co.  had  a  large  interest  in  that  particular 
road.  It  seems  that  Mr.  Mitchell  appreciated  the 
value  of  my  ambitious  plan  as  soon  as  he  knew  of  it, 
and  so  began  to  take  measures  to  forestall  me  in  put- 
ting it  through.  About  this  time  I  sought  the  co- 
operation of  my  father  who  at  my  solicitation  then 
actively  assisted  me  at  the  Chicago  end,  and  frequently 
saw  Mr.  N.  W.  Harris  in  connection  therewith.  I 
invited  him  to  join  me  in  pushing  the  consolidation, 
promising  that  we  would  be  in  it  on  equal  terms  if 
he  would  subscribe  a  liberal  amount  to  the  undertak- 
ing to  give  it  a  good  start  and  the  prestige  which  his 
name  would  lend  to  it.  He  was  not  enthusiastic,  as  he 
thought  it  premature.  He  later  agreed  however  to 
invest  fifty  thousand  dollars  in  the  bonds  of  my  con- 
solidation enterprise  if  I  succeeded  in  shaping  it  up. 

In  connection  with  these  various  negotiations,  I 
compiled  a  comprehensive  report  upon  the  street  rail- 
way situation  in  Seattle,  displaying  the  data  acquired, 
and  outlining  my  views  as  to  a  proper  physical  and 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  187 

financial  plan  of  consolidation.  In  this  report  I  for 
the  first  time  in  writing  in  1896  set  forth  my  idea  of 
developing  the  water  power  of  Snoqualmie  Falls.  As 
stated  before,  my  whole  thought  and  ambition,  aim 
and  work,  centered  around  this  one  idea,  namely  the 
proposed  Snoqualmie  Falls  Power  Plant,  and  my  dis- 
appointment in  the  failure  of  the  consolidation  on  ac- 
count of  the  opposition  of  Mr.  Mitchell  of  the  General 
Electric,  and  of  N.  W.  Harris  &  Co.,  had  its  bitterness 
more  in  the  disappointment  of  not  being  able  to  carry 
out  the  power  development  idea  at  that  time  than  in 
the  failure  of  the  consolidation  itself.  The  street  rail- 
ways were  afterwards  consolidated  by  Stone  &  Web- 
ster of  Boston  and  their  following,  whom  Mitchell 
and  the  General  Electric  Co.  had  interested  at  a  cost  to 
the  purchasers  of  over  a  million  dollars  more  than  the 
agreed  cost  would  have  been  to  us ;  and  thus  was  lost 
to  my  father  and  myself  the  several  million  dollars 
profit,  which  later  went  to  Stone  &  Webtser  and  their 
associates.  Father  had  never  taken  kindly  to  "pro- 
moting," as  otherwise  this  would  not  have  escaped 
us  as  it  did,  much  to  his  later  regret.  Mitchell's  oppo- 
sition to  me  sprang  from  his  jealously  and  resent- 
ment at  my  having  secured  the  Denny  contract  in 
competition  with  his  company,  and  also  a  profitable 
contract  for  building  an  electric  road  in  Spokane. 
The  apathy  or  reluctance  upon  the  part  of  Harris  & 
Co.  was  probably  due  to  Father's  undisguised  distrust 
of  that  firm  due  to  previous  acquaintance  with  them. 
The  consolidation  would  have  given  us  a  very  hand- 


188        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

some  profit,  and  it  was  my  plan  that  the  power  fea- 
ture of  it  should  take  the  form  of  a  separate  and 
independent  company,  which  as  such,  we  would  be 
able  to  own  personally  and  to  finance  out  of  the  profit 
to  accrue  to  us  from  the  consolidation  after  paying  as 
well  the  business  debts  which  had  foundered  me  dur- 
ing the  panic.  It  was  my  aim  and  determination  there- 
fore, to  keep  this  power  project  separate  and  indepen- 
dent, and  to  maintain  it  as  such  throughout  my  life, 
as  a  pleasant  and  profitable  business  for  my  father  and 
myself;  to  expand  it  as  the  country  grew;  to  reach 
out  to  other  cities  with  its  transmission  lines;  to  add 
to  it  other  water  powers  from  time  to  time,  and 
gradually  to  shape  it  so  as  to  serve  all  the  present  and 
prospective  users  of  power  in  the  Puget  Sound  coun- 
try. This  youthful  dream  of  mine,  considered  more 
or  less  chimerical  then,  began  to  be  appreciated  a 
few  years  later  by  my  later  rivals  Stone  &  Webster, 
who  have  since  then  been  aggressively  carrying  out 
my  ideas  in  building  up  the  great  electrical  system  as 
I  had  planned  it,  which  for  me  was  destined  to  be 
a  wil'o-the-wisp.  It  is  interesting  to  note  at  this  point, 
that  at  the  beginning  of  negotiations  we  soon  after 
had  with  Stone  &  Webster  looking  to  furnishing  their 
company  with  power,  that  firm  in  a  lengthy  letter  to 
us  asserted  that  "no  water  power  had  ever  been  me- 
chanically or  commercially  successful,  and  in  their 
judgment  no  water  power  ever  would  be  successful." 
The  South  side  of  Snoqualmie  River  was  owned  by 
a  woman  in  England,  who  owned  300  acres  of  land 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  189 

upon  which  the  Falls  was  situated,  and  which  she  had 
acquired  under  a  mortgage.  Judge  Burke,  a  leading 
lawyer  in  Seattle  was  her  attorney,  and  I  had  fre- 
quent consultations  with  him  in  regard  to  the  matter, 
letting  him  know  my  ideas  and  plans,  which  so  in- 
spired his  confidence  that  he  finally  gave  me  an  option 
on  the  property  at  the  very  low  original  cost  to  his 
client,  plus  the  accrued  interest,  taxes,  etc.,  amounting 
to  $40,500.00.  The  General  Electric  Company  which 
had  suddenly  awakened  to  the  possibilities  of  the  situ- 
ation, were  negotiating  for  this  property  at  the  same 
time,  and  my  taking  it  from  under  their  nose  was  an 
act  for  which  they  never  forgave  me,  and  they  never 
could  quite  understand  how  it  happened. 

I  frequently  discussed  with  my  father  by  letters 
from  Seattle  and  in  person  while  in  Chicago,  my 
progress  and  disappointment  in  the  failure  of  the  con- 
solidation on  account  of  my  cherished  idea  of  harness- 
ing the  water  power,  which  I  had  calculated  would 
deliver  me  from  bondage  to  my  creditors,  and  open 
for  us  both  a  prosperous  future.  I  then  and  therefore 
laid  the  matter  before  him  of  the  water  power  alone, 
as  an  independent  project  by  itself,  upon  the  theory 
that  it  would  be  within  the  limitations  of  one  man  to 
accomplish  the  financing  of  the  same,  and  that  there 
would  be  no  opposition  or  barriers  in  the  way  such  as 
clouded  my  consolidation  project.  I  asked  him  to 
join  me  in  this  plan  financially  and  to  become  inter- 
ested equally  with  me  as  a  partner.  I  had  previously 
negotiated  with  other  parties  on  the  same  terms  but 


190         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

they  did  not  make  good.  I  accordingly  elucidated  to 
him  more  fully  my  plans  and  purposes,  all  of  which 
interested  him  very  greatly,  for  he  had  a  mechanical 
mind  in  addition  to  his  well-known  business  shrewd- 
ness and  commercial  instinct.  He  gave  the  matter 
more  serious  consideration  than  previously,  for  he  had 
just  made  a  small  fortune  in  wheat  resulting  from 
Joe  Leiter's  famous  corner  and  wanted  to  invest  it. 
He  had  also  grown  to  have  complete  confidence  in 
my  business  and  engineering  ability.  When  I  left 
Chicago  to  return  to  Seattle,  his  last  words  in  answer 
to  my  importunities  were :  "I  will  send  you  the  money 
to  buy  the  Falls,"  and  this  promise  he  fulfilled,  so  that 
I  was  able  to  take  up  my  option  on  the  Falls  in  October, 
1898;  and  his  assurances  in  connection  therewith  and 
his  acceptance  of  the  arrangement  for  partnership  as 
I  proposed  it  led  me  then  to  stake  my  whole  future 
irrevocably  upon  the  work  ahead.  This  then  was  the 
second  important  step  in  the  inauguration  of  this  great 
enterprise  and  the  beginning  of  our  partnership 
relations. 

Upon  my  return  to  Seattle  I  had  the  title  to  the 
property  examined,  and  the  agreed  purchase  price  of 
$40,500.00  was  paid  before  my  option  expired,  I  draw 
ing  upon  Father  with  his  authority  for  that  amount. 
During  the  period  of  my  option,  I  could  have  made 
$50,000.00  by  releasing  it  to  an  Englishman,  who  sud- 
denly concluded  that  he  wanted  to  own  the  Falls  him- 
self. This  opportunity  I  of  course  declined,  knowing 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  191 

that  I  could  do  many  fold  better  by  carrying  my  plans 
to  completion  in  connection  with  my  father. 

The  purchase  of  the  water  power  rights  made 
through  Judge  Burke  covered  the  south  side  of 
the  river  only,  so  I  immediately  began  negoti- 
ations with  certain  Ohio  people  who  owned  the 
north  side,  which  resulted  in  the  purchase  of  that 
side  as  well,  and  thus  was  completed  the  control 
and.  ownership  of  this  magnificent  spectacle  of 
nature  and  engine  of  industry.  By  my  direction 
the  titles  of  these  properties  were  taken  in  my 
father's  name,  for  the  use  of  my  name  for  the  pur- 
pose would  have  encumbered  them  with  my  liabilities 
and  thus  endangered  the  project,  and  besides  I  wanted 
to  attach  the  prestige  of  his  name  to  the  project.  This 
was  the  real  beginning  of  the  partnership  entered  into 
between  my  father  and  myself  for  the  purpose  of 
carrying  out  my  plans  for  the  development  of  the  profi- 
table and  valuable  Baker  electric  properties  in  the 
Puget  Sound  country.  I  needed  such  a  person  as  him- 
self for  the  purpose  of  providing  the  initial  money 
necessary  for  the  execution  of  my  projects.  I  pre- 
ferred him  to  any  one  else  because  he  was  my  father, 
and  because  therefore  I  could  trust  him  in  the  same 
way  that  he  trusted  me.  Because  of  this  mutual  and 
reciprocal  confidence  our  arrangement  was  purely 
verbal,  simply  an  understanding  between  a  father  and 
his  son  as  partners,  that  the  one  as  financier  would 
provide  or  arrange  for  the  money,  while  the  other  as 
engineer  and  manager  would  contribute  his  invention 


192         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

and  discovery,  his  skill  and  ability,  his  time  and  his 
labor,  wholly  and  without  distraction.  We  were  to 
share  alike  the  honors  and  profit  which  success  would 
bring,  as  well  as  the  loss  and  discredit  which  failure 
would  mean.  Our  partnership  relations  as  related  he 
often  talked  of  to  his  intimate  friends.  For  me  it 
meant  honorable  fame  or  a  blighted  reputation,  and 
for  us  both  it  meant  a  fortune  made  or  crippled.  For 
me  success  meant  more  than  honor  and  fortune;  it 
meant  the  real  joy  to  which  I  had  long  looked  forward, 
of  drawing  my  father  into  a  business  relation  with  me 
of  my  own  conception,  by  which  he  would  later  take 
additional  pride  in  me  as  a  son  who  had  thus  been  the 
means  of  adding  to  his  fortune  as  well  as  to  my  own, 
and  of  drawing  him  away  from  the  wearisome  and 
wearing  Board  of  Trade.  My  ambition  was  later 
realized,  but  it  came  too  late  to  do  all  for  him  that  I 
had  counted  upon  as  he  died  before  our  work  was 
finished. 

II. 

Let  me  now  describe  this  enterprise  as  I  planned 
it  and  as  we  finally  in  five  years  completed  it  in  the 
shape  that  one  sees  it  today  as  the  socalled  "Eighth 
Wonder  of  the  World,"  by  which  name  many  have 
dubbed  it.  Snoqualmie  Falls,  situated  in  the  foothills 
of  the  Cascade  Mountains,  results  from  the  river  of 
the  same  name  falling  in  one  leap  over  a  precipice 
270  feet  high.  The  name  is  the  white  man's  corrup- 
tion of  the  name  of  a  tribe  of  Indians  called  in  their 


LONGITUDINAL  SECTION  SNOQUALMIE  POWER  PLANT. 


CONSTRUCTING  DAM  ABOVE  SNOOUALMIE  FALLS. 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS 


193 


SNOQUALMIE.  FAILS  &  WHITE  RIVER  POWER  Co. 

SCATTLE  •-•  TACOMA 
Chart  of  Power  Transmission  and  Utilization 


language    "Sdoh-kwahl-bu,"    meaning    the    "Moon 
People,"  because  of  their  alleged  lunar  origin. 

About  500  feet  back  from 
the  crest  of  the  Falls  the  river 
is  diverted  downward  through 
its  bed  through  an  excavated 
shaft  10x28  feet,  which  at 
the  level  of  the  lower  river 
abruptly  turns  towards  the 
foot  of  the  falls,  at  the  same 
time  being  enlarged  into  a 
large  chamber,  cave  or  cavity, 
200  feet  long,  40  feet  wide, 
and  30  feet  high,  all  of  which 
was  excavated  out  of  the 
solid  rock  with  the  use  of 
dynamite.  This  is  the  power 
house,  in  which  are  installed 
five  great  water  wheels. — one 
of  which  is  the  largest  in  the 
world,  and  the  generators,  capable  of  delivering 
altogether  19,000  electrical  horse  power.  The  water 
after  passing  down  the  shaft  through  the  two 
eight  foot  wrought  iron  stand  pipes  and  dis- 
charging through  the  water  wheels,  escapes  through 
a  tunnel  about  400  feet  long,  likewise  excavated 
out  of  the  solid  rock,  and  emptying  back  in 
the  river  at  the  foot  of  the  falls.  The  whole 
conception  is  very  bold,  and  is  weird  in  aspect  as  one 
looks  upon  the  thundering  machinery,  nearly  three 


Diagramatic      representation      of 

the    Generation,    Transmission 

and    Distribution    of    Sno- 

qualmie  and  White   River 

Power. 


194         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

hundred  feet  below  the  ground,  eternally  busy  at  work 
in  the  rock  cave  looking  like  white  marble, — for  the 
rocks  have  been  whitewashed.  The  "cavity"  is 
lighted  by  electricity  and  looks  as  gay  and  brilliant 
as  a  ballroom.  The  electricity  generated  in  the  cavity 
is  transmitted  on  cables  up  the  same  shaft  which  car- 
ries the  pressure  pipes,  and  is  led  into  the  transformer 
house  above,  where  the  voltage  is  raised  to  32,000 
through  a  series  of  transformers,  at  which  high  pres- 
sure it  is  transmitted  over  aluminum  lines  to  the  sub- 
stations in  Seattle,  32  miles,  Tacoma,  44  miles,  Ever- 
ett, 36  miles,  and  the  several  intervening  small  towns. 
At  these  places  and  in  very  handsome  and  substantial, 
buildings  the  location  of  which  I  personally  and  care- 
fully selected,  the  current  is  stepped  down  again  in 
voltage  to  2,200  and  distributed  over  a  net  work  of 
wires  to  the  local  customers. 

Contemporaneously  with  this  development,  I  ar- 
ranged with  the  Westinghouse  Electric  Company  for 
the  purchase  of  certain  water  rights  and  lands  held  by 
them  upon  the  White  River  about  25  miles  from  Sno- 
qualmie  Falls,  for  the  sum  of  $30,500.00.  I  took  this 
in  hand  first  as  an  option,  but  later  on  we  paid  the 
money  and  acquired  it  outright.  The  plan  I  had  de- 
vised for  the  development  on  this  river  made  it  the 
simplest  and  least  costly,  and  at  that  time,  the  largest 
single  power  development  in  the  world,  namely,  60,- 
ooo  H.P.  I  really  took  more  pride  in  this  project  than 
in  the  first  one.  It  is  as  yet  unfinished  owing  to  the 
attack  made  upon  it  in  the  courts  by  Stone  &  Webster, 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  195 

who  had  rival  interests  in  Seattle  and  Tacoma,  and 
were  therefore  anxious  to  crush  out  in  its  infancy  this 
new  project,  which  by  the  very  nature  of  it  could  de- 
stroy any  rival  opposing  it.  Up  to  the  time  of  this 
attack  which  interrupted  our  work  there,  we  had  ex- 
pended $165,000  on  this  development,  in  the  purchase 
of  lands  and  rights  and  in  actual  construction  work, 
and  most  of  this  money  came  out  of  our  Snoqualmie 
earnings.  These  two  enterprises,  Snoqualmie  and 
White  River,  taken  together  as  one,  form  probably 
the  most  profitable,  reliable  and  enduring  hydro-elec- 
tric public  utility  power  development  known  anywhere 
in  the  world. 

In  brief,  the  plan  for  White  River  is  to  divert  it 
from  its  bed  across  a  tableland  through  an  excavated 
canal  only  three  miles  in  length,  into  a  series  of  lakes, 
which  raised  to  a  common  level  and  overflowed  to- 
gether, will  submerge  the  intervening  valleys  and 
form  one  lake  4,000  acres  in  area  and  capable  of 
being  drawn  down  thirty  feet.  The  geological  forma- 
tion is  cement  gravel  and  is  therefore  ideal  for  reser- 
voir purposes.  From  this  consolidated  lake  which  T 
named  Lake  Dorothy  in  honor  of  my  little  daughter, 
the  water  will  flow  through  pipes  to  the  great  brick 
and  stone  power  house  in  the  valley  below  under  a 
head  of  485  feet,  nearly  twice  as  high  as  Snoqualmie 
Falls.  In  simplicity,  substantiality  and  stupendous- 
ness,  the  White  River  project  is  without  its  equal  any- 
where. From  this  plant  Seattle  is  twenty-five  miles 
distant,  and  Tacoma  is  only  ten  miles.  I  planned 


196        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

to  have  this  plant  and  Snoqualmie  connected 
together  electrically  into  one  great  system,  and  hav- 
ing this  in  mind,  I  built  the  Snoqualmie  transmission 
lines  so  as  to  pass  the  doors  of  the  White  River  power 
house. 

It  is  interesting  to  repeat  again  right  here,  as  ex- 
hibiting Father's  absolute  and  unwavering  faith  in  my 
integrity,  judgment  and  skill  in  these  matters,  which 
were  the  principal  security  for  his  money  advanced  in 
connection  with  our  work,  that  he  never  saw  the 
White  River  property  a  single  time,  and  he  saw  the 
Snoqualmie  property  but  three  times,  and  then  only 
a  very  fezv  hours  each  time.  He  rested  absolutely 
upon  me,  and  his  belief  in  me  was  never  shaken,  al- 
though more  than  once  did  our  enemies  adroitly  at- 
tempt to  do  so.  I  seldom  referred  anything  to  him 
until  after  it  was  done,  and  he  never  hindered  me  in  my 
plans.  His  part  was  to  do  the  financing, — mine  was 
to  contribute  the  plan,  do  the  work  and  get  the  results, 
although  I  helped  in  the  financing  by  assisting  nego- 
tiations in  the  East,  and  by  arranging  loans  in  Seattle 
and  Tacoma,  and  giving  my  personal  endorsement 
thereon  at  times.  He  gave  me  absolutely  free  rein  in  all 
matters  of  policy,  construction  and  finances,  and  only 
questioned  my  motives  at  times  to  draw  me  out  in 
defense  of  the  same,  knowing  that  I  held  his  interest 
in  our  work  more  sacred  than  I  did  my  own.  He  sel- 
dom advised  me  in  matters  of  management  but  con- 
tented himself  with  the  single  duty  of  providing  funds 
upon  my  requisition.  I  of  course  almost  daily  re- 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  197 

viewed  my  work  to  him  by  letter  and  gave  him  that 
full  confidence  and  attention  that  one  partner  should 
give  to  another.  He  always  acted  under  my  direction 
in  all  our  mutual  matters  in  furtherance  of  the  part- 
nership relation.  No  father  by  his  constant  attitude 
ever  paid  a  finer  tribute  to  a  son  than  this  father  thus 
did  to  me,  and  no  son  ever  felt  a  keener  regard  for  a 
father's  welfare  and  happiness  than  I  did  for  mine. 

It  would  be  interesting  to  give  some  account  of  the 
history  of  the  construction  of  these  plants  and  the 
many  physical  and  other  difficulties  which  had  to  be 
contended  with  and  all  of  which  were  successfully  sur- 
mounted. Such  a  history  would  begin  with  our  pre- 
liminary engineering  plans,  and  at  a  time  when  I  went 
on  foot  through  the  dense  jungle  above  and  below  the 
cataract  for  the  purpose  of  exploring  the  situation 
there ;  and  then  as  a  pathfinder,  blazing  the  trail  over 
the  mountains  and  through  the  forests  to  the  distant 
cities  for  the  purpose  of  locating  the  electric  trans- 
mission lines  thereto.  In  the  same  connection,  other 
water  power  possibilities  were  explored  by  me  in 
order  to  judge  of  what  bearing,  if  any,  they  might 
have  upon  this  particular  situation,  and  with  the  idea 
of  adding  them  to  our  general  system  later  on  in  ac- 
cordance with  my  preconceived  plan  for  one  great 
electrical  system  for  Puget  Sound. 

Then  next  in  order,  we  installed  a  steam  plant  at 
the  head  works  for  operating  the  hoisting  engines, 
air  compressors,  and  other  machinery  in  connection 
with  our  construction  operations,  and  a  coffer  dam 


198         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

was  built  around  the  proposed  intake.  Then  drilling 
at  the  tunnel  below  and  at  the  shaft  above  was  started 
by  means  of  the  air-compressing  plant,  and  the  dyna- 
mite blasts  began  to  do  their  work.  None  of  the  work 
was  contracted  out,  as  it  was  uncertain  in  character 
and  had  to  be  most  carefully  done ;  so  we  did  it  by  day 
and  night  labor  under  an  organization  created  and 
supervised  by  myself,  and  running  three  shifts  of  men. 
It  would  be  interesting  to  tell  of  a  party  of  men  who 
went  to  the  scene  of  the  operations  at  this  time  as  my 
guests  and  watched  the  slender  air  drills  beginning  to 
hammer  the  hard  basalt  rock  mountain  side  below 
the  Falls  and  the  rock  river  bed  above,  and  how  when 
I  told  them  of  the  plan  to  thus  dig  a  great  subter- 
annean  chamber  out  of  the  solid  rock  500  feet  back 
in  the  cliff  for  a  power  house,  for  the  purpose  of  re- 
ceiving the  water  from  the  river  above  and  discharg- 
ing it  again  into  the  river  below  after  deriving  the 
energy  from  it  through  the  water  wheels  they  stood 
in  blank  amazement  and  with  looks  of  sympathy  por- 
trayed upon  their  faces  as  much  as  to  say  "poor  fool." 
At  the  same  time,  our  agents  went  out  and  pro- 
cured the  rights  of  way  for  the  transmission  lines, 
and  following  them  came  the  several  extensive  crews 
of  laborers  who  felled  the  trees  and  cleared  away  the 
forest  debris  in  a  swathe  500  feet  wide  in  many  places, 
for  no  tree  either  good  or  bad  was  allowed  to  stand 
which  by  its  possible  falling  might  reach  the  lines. 
And  then  through  this  right  of  way  thus  prepared  the 
poles  were  set  and  the  wires  strung  thereon,  and  then 


SEATTLE  SUBSTATION  AND  GENERAL  OFFICES. 


TACOMA    SUBSTATION. 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  199 

the  commodious  distributing  stations  in  the  cities  and 
towns  were  built.  Many  tons  of  dynamite  were  ex- 
ploded in  making  the  excavation  for  the  power  house, 
and  so  skillfully  was  it  managed  that  no  one  was 
killed  nor  even  hurt.  Then  came  the  lowering  of  the 
mighty  machinery  into  the  artificial  cave  300  feet  be- 
low the  ground  without  an  untoward  accident,  many 
of  the  single  parts  weighing  26,000  pounds,  and  soon 
after  that  the  finished  plant  began  its  noted  and  suc- 
cessful career. 

The  starting  in  operation  of  the  first  10,000  H.P. 
section  of  our  completed  plant  was  heralded  by  my 
introducing  to  the  situation  at  this  time  my  mascot, 
my  little  daughter  Dorothy,  who  was  then  only 
eighteen  months  old,  and  who  had  the  same  birthday 
as  my  father  and  step-mother.  Responding  to  her 
part  of  the  program  at  8  o'clock  one  evening,  she  was 
lifted  high  up  and  turned  the  switch  in  the  presence 
of  many  spectators,  which  for  the  first  time  in  the  his- 
tory of  Snoqualmie  Falls  turned  loose  its  subtle  power 
within  the  borders  of  Seattle,  and  proclaimed  this 
fact  in  dazzling  evidence  across  the  top  of  the  sub- 
station by  means  of  the  words — "Snoqualmie  Light" 
outlined  in  electric  lights.  So  much  for  a  brief  his- 
tory of  our  constructional  operations ;  now  let  me  re- 
late something  of  our  financial  and  commercial  his- 
tory as  well. 

I  deemed  it  best  in  the  exploitation  of  our  several 
enterprises,  to  do  so  under  the  multiple  company  plan 
and  then  later  to  put  them  together  into  one  large 


200         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

company.  This  plan  we  carried  out.  I  therefore  first 
organized  the  parent  or  supply  company,  to  which  we 
later  turned  over  the  power  plant.  This  company  was 
to  be  related  contractually  to  its  two  subsidiary  or 
distributing  companies  organized  upon  financial 
plans  as  follows  :— 

Snoqualmie  Falls  Power  Co.  (generating),  $500,- 
ooo  capital  stock. 

Seattle  Cataract  Co.  (distributing),  $100,000 
capital  stock. 

Tacoma  Cataract  Co.  (distributing),  $100,000 
capital  stock. 

These  three  companies  I  caused  to  authorize  bond 
issues  of  $750,000,  $300,000  and  $200,000  respect- 
ively. We  also  owned  as  mentioned  before  the  White 
River  Power  Company  having  $1,500,000  capital 
stock. 

In  the  beginning  of  our  operations  in  accordance 
with  the  understanding  of  our  partnership  relation, 
my  father  advanced  his  own  money  to  defray  the  ex- 
penses of  construction  under  my  supervision.  How- 
ever, as  soon  as  we  had  made  a  substantial  showing, 
we  began  to  look  forward  to  financing  our  operations 
in  the  open  market,  and  to  this  end  I  arranged  for 
my  father  and  Mason,  Lewis  &  Company,  a  banking 
firm  of  Chicago,  to  meet  for  the  purpose  of  arranging 
for  the  sale  of  a  bond  issue.  Father  was  a  stranger 
to  this  firm,  but  my  acquaintanceship  with  them  was 
close  on  account  of  my  previous  negotiations  with 
them  in  connection  with  the  consolidation  of  the  Street 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  201 

Railways  in  Seattle,  for  which  reason  I  wanted  them 
to  undertake  the  Snoqualmie  issue.  I  came  East  and 
joined  my  father  in  presenting  our  matters  to  this 
firm  and  we  finally  arranged  for  them  to  take  our  first 
issue,  viz. :  $600,000.00  of  bonds  of  the  parent  com- 
pany under  the  $750,000.00  mortgage,  at  the  net  price 
to  us  of  95  and  without  any  stock  bonus  or  sweetening 
whatsoever. 

This  issue  of  bonds  was  the  first  that  had 
ever  been  put  out  in  the  open  market  by  any  hydro- 
electric company  upon  a  water  power  long  dis- 
tance transmission  project,  and  it  required  a  long 
educational  campaign  to  have  the  public  think  well 
enough  of  them  to  take  them  in  any  quantities.  It 
looked  at  one  time  as  though  Mason,  Lewis  &  Com- 
pany would  make  a  complete  failure  of  the  flotation. 
For  the  purpose  of  educating  the  bond  buying  public, 
I  therefore  wrote  many  articles,  descriptive  of  the 
work  and  argumentative  of  its  success,  which  were 
published  in  various  magazines,  scientific  papers  and 
daily  newspapers.  I  also  turned  prominent  visitors 
to  Tacoma  and  Seattle  to  our  account  by  taking  them 
to  the  falls  to  inspect  the  work  and  thereby  always 
making  them  thereafter  our  champions.  I  did  this 
whether  they  were  prospective  bond  buyers  or  not. 
This  educational  campaign  had  its  final  effect  and  the 
issue  was  in  time  disposed  of  at  the  price  that  had  been 
contracted  to  us. 

When  an  underwriter  buys  an  issue  of  bonds,  he 
has  to  consider  the  point  of  view  of  the  man  who  be- 


202         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

comes  the  actual  and  final  investor  in  the  bond.  The 
underwriter  usually  sells  to  the  country  banks  or  to 
Trust  Companies  in  large  lots,  and  they  in  turn  dis- 
tribute them  about  until  finally  widows,  farmers,  or 
orphans  own  a  single  bond  or  very  few  at  most. 
These  then  are  the  persons  who  have  to  be  educated. 
When  it  was  explained  to  such  as  these  by  the  agents 
of  Mason,  Lewis  &  Company  that  it  was  our  purpose  to 
bring  the  power  of  a  great  cataract  over  three  small 
wires  strung  over  the  mountains  and  through  the 
valleys  to  Seattle  and  Tacoma,  thirty  and  forty  miles 
away,  they  would  have  looks  upon  their  faces  sug- 
gestive of  the  thought  that  they  were  up  against  a 
confidence  game.  It  was  too  absurd  a  proposition  for 
most  of  them  to  take  seriously,  so  that  one  can  readily 
understand  the  magnitude  of  the  educational  task  be- 
fore us.  Following  our  pioneering  of  this  issue,  the 
water  power  bonds  of  other  companies  as  a  security 
has  crept  up  from  the  low  estimate  at  which  it  was 
first  received  until  they  now  rank  with  high  grade 
railroads  and  gas  bonds. 

We  also  in  accordance  with  my  plan  of  organization 
as  stated  before,  placed  bond  mortgages  upon  the  two 
Cataract  Companies  and  issued  bonds  thereunder 
covering  the  cost  of  construction  incurred  by  these 
subsidiary  companies.  These  bonds  Father  carried 
himself  as  we  wished  to  have  them  at  our  command 
at  a  future  time,  when  we  planned  to  refund  them 
by  the  issues  of  a  consolidated  company. 

In  publishing  Snoqualmie  to  the  world  I  never 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  203 

missed  any  opportunities  that  came  along  to  make  a 
"story"  out  of  some  event  or  other.  The  event  which 
attracted  the  most  widespread  notice  and  caused  our 
project  to  be  lectured  about  and  published  in  Europe 
as  well  as  in  this  country,  was  the  first  great  distance 
test.  We  had  two  circuits  built  to  Seattle  and  two 
to  Tacoma.  These  I  connected  up  temporarily  into 
one  long  circuit — 154  miles — beginning  and  ending 
at  Snoqualmie.  A  generator  at  one  end  supplied  the 
current,  while  the  neighboring  generator  at  the  other 
end, — only  ten  feet  distant  in  fact,  although  1 54  miles 
distant  electrically,  received  the  current  as  a  motor 
and  was  operated  by  it.  The  losses  in  transmission 
were  noted  under  varying  loads  and  different  volt- 
ages, and  the  results  were  given  to  the  Associated 
Press  which  gave  it  world-wide  publicity. 

When  I  organized  the  several  companies,  I  in- 
stalled directors  from  among  my  trusted  friends  with- 
out consulting  my  father  but  with  his  consent,  as  he  did 
not  want  to  hamper  me  in  my  management,  inasmuch 
as  the  responsibility  for  winning  our  final  success 
rested  upon  me.  I  handled  all  the  campaigns  for  se- 
curing franchises  in  Seattle,  Tacoma  and  other  cities, 
and  I  generally  applied  for  them  in  his  name  in  order 
to  attach  to  my  application  the  greater  importance  and 
prestige  that  his  wellknown  name  would  give  to 
them.  In  some  of  the  smaller  and  unimportant  places, 
I  took  the  franchises  in  my  own  name,  and  afterwards 
assigned  both  those  in  his  name  and  my  own  to  the 
proper  companies.  Because  of  Father  being  so  well 


204        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

and  favorably  known  in  the  financial  world  I  used  his 
name  very  often  in  connection  with  our  projects,  for 
I  regarded  it  as  a  valuable  asset.  I  did  this  gen- 
erally without  his  knowledge  in  the  first  instance,  but 
always  had  him  confirm  my  use  of  his  name  later, 
which  he  always  did  very  promptly. 

There  is  probably  no  other  plant  in  this  country 
of  the  same  capacity  so  cheaply  and  at  the  same  time 
so  well  built  as  our  Snoqualmie  plant.  The  construc- 
tion cost  per  H.P.  will  be  seen  to  be  about  $80.00,  in- 
cluding the  distributing  systems  in  Seattle,  Tacoma 
and  the  small  towns.  With  these  local  systems  elimi- 
nated, the  cost  would  be  nearer  $50.00  per  H.P.,  an 
extraordinarily  low  showing.  This  compares  favor- 
ably with  the  Puyallup  plant  near  Tacoma  on  the  same 
basis  at  $200.00,  Niagara  Falls  at  over  $200.00,  and 
nearly  all  the  rest  of  the  list  at  $100.00  to  $150.00 
per  H.P. 

Before  the  Snoqualmie  plant  was  completed,  I  be- 
gan to  make  contracts  for  selling  the  power  at  good 
rates  and  for  long  terms.  The  business  came  faster 
than  we  could  handle  it  so  that  our  capacity  was  soon 
overtaxed  resulting  in  our  having  to  equip  a  2,000 
H.P.  steam  plant  in  Tacoma  as  a  temporary  relay 
while  we  were  doubling  the  capacity  at  the  Falls.  We 
pulled  the  street  railways,  smelters,  flour  mills,  ma- 
chine shops,  lighting,  etc.  With  Snoqualmie  only  half 
loaded  and  with  White  River  not  finished  nor  in  oper- 
ation, our  enterprise  was  clearing  at  the  time  I  was 
euchred  out  of  it  after  my  father's  death  as  related 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS 


205 


further  on,  about  $100,000  a  year  after  paying  all 
expenses  and  fixed  charges,  and  this  surplus  we  al- 
ways applied  to  White  River  construction  and  Sno- 
qualmie  extensions.  The  following  statement  shows 
the  gross  earnings,  expenses  and  profit  for  the  year 
1904,  which  year  closed  with  my  banishment  from  the 
company : — 


Month. 
January    

1 
Gross 
Earnings. 
$22,733.95 

Maintenance 
and 
Expenses. 
$7,693.85 
7,174.13 
8,030.95 
8,449.46 
8,773.34 
8,288.64 
9,871.55 
7,966.18 
7,816.09 
8,860.73 
9,251.01 
11,224.92 

Net 
Earnings 
from 
Operations. 
$15,040.10 
15,116.28 
12,601.03 
11,122.13 
10,808.21 
10,610.14 
6,267.50 
10,180.20 
12,331.55 
16,086.37 
15,852.39 
14,371.57 

Bond 
Interest. 
$4,020.83 
3,908.33 
3,908.33 
3,908.33 
3,908.33 
3,908.33 
3,908.33 
3,908.33 
3,908.33 
3,908.33 
4,462.50 
4,462.50 

Other 
Interest. 
$1,176.78 
1,317.08 
1,349.33 
1,424.62 
1,653.15 
1,578.44 
1,585.54 
1,695.94 
1,672.86 
1,604.39 
236.69 
1,957.30 

Surplus. 
$9,842.49 
9,890.87 
7,343.37 
5,789.18 
5,246.73 
5,123.37 
773.63 
4,575.93 
6,750.36 
10,573.65 
11,626.58 
7,951.77 

February 
March     

22,290.41 
20  631  98 

19  571  59 

May     

19,581.55 

June    

18  898.78 

uly   

16  139  05 

August    

18,146.38 

September    .  .  . 

20,147.64 
24,947.10 

November     .  .  . 
December 

25,103.40 
25,596.49 

Total  $253,788.32 $102, 400.85  $150,387.47  $48,120.80  $16,778.74  $85,487.93 

It  will  be  observed  that  the  company's  operating  cost 
was  only  40  per  cent  of  its  gross  earnings,  an  extraor- 
dinary showing  and  not  equalled  anywhere  else  that 
I  am  aware.  This  favorable  showing  is  due  to  the 
permanent  style  of  construction  and  simplicity  of 
design.  It  should  be  here  noted  that  March,  April  and 
May  earnings  were  shrunk  as  a  result  of  a  fire  at  Sno- 
qualmie  Falls,  which  destroyed  the  transforming  plant 
and  temporarily  crippled  the  capacity  of  the  plant. 
It  should  be  noted  also  that  the  Seattle  Electric  Com- 
pany load  was  dropped  at  one  stroke  in  July  as  the 
first  move  on  our  part  to  get  rid  of  that  undesirable 
customer,  and  this  shrunk  the  earnings  for  that  month 
$4,500.00.  Had  there  been  no  untoward  incidents 
such  as  those  referred  to,  the  net  earnings  would  have 


206         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

been  normally  about  $12,000  more,  and  the  ratio  of 
expense  to  earnings  would  have  then  been  38  per  cent. 
With  the  doubling  of  the  capacity  by  a  10  per  cent  in- 
crease in  our  investment,  which  I  had  nearly  com- 
pleted at  the  time  of  my  decapitation,  and  the  conse- 
quential increase  in  earnings,  this  ratio  should  have 
been  reduced  to  25  per  cent,  but  it  has  not  been  pos- 
sible to  improve  upon  the  half  capacity  ratio  above 
cited,  on  account  of  the  figure  head  staff  expense,  the 
incompetent  management,  and  the  jobs  which  have 
since  been  levied  on  the  company.  I  often  predicted 
to  Father  that  Snoqualmie  would  earn  gross  nearly 
three-quarters  of  a  million  dollars  a  year,  and  this 
prediction  has  since  been  fulfilled  as  the  result  of  my 
doubling  the  capacity  of  the  plant. 

It  is  apparent  from  the  foregoing  statement 
that  the  six  per  cent,  upon  the  preferred  stock  of  our 
company  was  at  that  time  being  earned  with  less  than 
the  full  capacity  of  the  original  plant  being  taxed  for 
the  purpose,  while  we  used  the  surplus  in  completing 
the  building  of  the  plant,  and  developing  the  White 
River  power  project.  There  was  additionally  avail- 
able for  the  future,  the  revenue  to  be  derived  from  the 
sales  of  the  residue  power,  together  with  the  10,000 
H.P.  more  which  later  came  from  the  doubling  of  the 
plant,  together  with  60,000  H.P.  more  which  is  now 
awaiting  the  completion  of  the  development  at  White 
River,  all  of  which  will  accrue  to  the  benefit  of  the 
common  stock,  and  would  eventually  have  made  it 
worth,  as  I  told  Father,  $400  to  $500  per  share,  a 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  207 

result  which  would  have  been  obtained  had  not  the 
company,  through  the  accident  of  his  death,  gotten 
into  the  hands  of  incompetents  and  unscrupulous 
manipulators.  Although  his  life  forms  no  further 
part  of  this  story,  yet  this  history  will  be  continued 
until  the  final  completion  of  the  work  which  we  had 
undertaken  together. 

My  father's  estate  was  taken  in  charge  soon  after 
his  death  by  his  administrators,  and  my  half  of  the 
company  not  yet  having  been  segregated  from  his  es- 
tate, was  likewise  taken  in  charge  by  the  same  ad- 
ministrators. As  a  result  of  this,  both  his  stock  and 
my  own  was  turned  against  me,  which  he  being  dead 
could  not  prevent,  nor  could  I.  My  positions  and 
honors  were  then  taken  from  me  and  given  to  four 
others  on  the  inside,  for  it  took  four  unacquainted  with 
such  work  to  do  what  I  had  been  doing.  The  object 
of  this  was  not  told  at  that  time  or  since,  although  it 
has  been  apparent  since  by  what  has  transpired 
under  the  new  management  as  hereafter  related.  This 
added  expense  was  partly  met  by  reducing  the  pay  of 
our  operators  and  running  two  shifts  in  24  hours  in 
place  of  three.  This  resulted  in  all  the  old  men  leav- 
ing and  their  places  being  given  to  cheap,  inex- 
perienced men.  It  is  estimated  by  experts  that  this 
"econonmy"  has  probably  added  I  per  cent  to  the 
annual  depreciation  of  the  plant. 

After  the  Snoqualmie  service  had  demonstrated 
itself  in  Seattle,  I  then  applied  for  franchises  in 
Whatcom  at  the  north  end  of  Puget  Sound,  in  Port- 


208         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

land,  Oregon,  about  125  miles  south  of  Tacoma,  and 
in  all  the  intervening  towns  and  counties,  in  order  to 
pave  the  way  for  the  "greater  Snoqualmie,"  of  which 
our  accomplishment  so  far  was  but  the  nucleus.  These 
franchises  were  allowed  to  die  by  my  successors  who 
failed  to  comprehend  the  broad  scope  of  our  enter- 
prise, so  that  our  competitors  have  since  seized  upon 
the  opportunities  which  we  pointed  out  and  my  suc- 
cessors neglected. 

My  exile  from  the  kingdom  which  Father  and  I 
had  created,  which  we  owned  together,  and  over 
which  we  held  sway,  seems  to  have  been  inspired  for 
the  purpose  of  eliminating  all  obstacles  to  the  manipu- 
lation of  the  property  for  the  private  benefit  of  those 
who  drove  me  out.  It  was  an  act  of  injustice  to  me, 
of  reckless  disregard  of  the  interests  of  the  stock- 
holders as  has  since  been  evident,  and  an  insult  to  and 
desecration  of  my  father's  memory.  Father  and  I  built 
the  plant  to  stand  forever,  and  not  as  a  stock  jobbing 
scheme,  with  the  result  that  there  is  no  better  built 
plant  in  the  world, — to  achieve  which  was  my  set  pur- 
pose. The  wisdom  of  this  course  which  our  oppon- 
ents at  that  time  called  "extravagant"  is  now  daily  ap- 
parent from  the  fact  that  the  plant  operates  year  in 
and  year  out  at  low  expense,  without  any  steam  plant 
relay  and  without  accidents  or  a  second  of  interrup- 
tion, a  record  to  be  envied  by  the  most  up-to-date 
steam  plant.  Because  nature  had  done  so  much  in 
facilitating  and  simplifying  our  operations,  and  be- 
cause we  spent  no  money  in  submitting  to  graft,  our 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  209 

plant  cost  only  half  as  much  per  H.P.  as  most  other 
plants  have  done,  although  Father  and  I  paid  dearly 
for  this  result  in  the  trials  and  tribulations  which  we 
endured  by  not  submitting  to  graft. 

Although  the  Snoqualmie  project  was  inspired  as 
related  to  deliver  me  from  a  financial  dilemma,  yet  it 
has  been  too  tardy  to  perform  that  duty  on  account 
of  the  complications  arising  from  the  death  of  my 
father.  However,  I  have  since  been  fortunate  in  other 
ways  notwithstanding  and  have  been  able  to  bring  a 
cloudless  sky  over  my  head  again.  At  one  time  we 
thought  that  certain  of  this  indebtedness  would  pre- 
judice the  credit  of  the  company  on  account  of  my 
being  the  head  of  it,  and  we  therefore  paid  certain  of 
it  under  Father's  direction,  and  the  amount  paid  out 
was  charged  against  my  interest  in  the  partnership. 

The  conception  of  the  Snoqualmie  project  was  in- 
spired by  my  unfortunate  financial  condition  at  the 
time,  which  I  could  only  look  forward  to  correcting 
when  our  work  shall  have  been  completed  and  success 
achieved.  On  account  of  this  situation  therefore,  and 
the  fact  that  I  had  resigned  the  Bank  receivership  in 
order  to  give  up  all  my  time  to  the  power  project  I 
had  a  small  drawing  account  for  bare  living  expenses 
during  the  construction  period  as  agreed  to  between 
my  father  and  myself  which  was  to  be  charged  against 
my  interest  in  the  profits  as  they  would  later  appear, — 
and  I  denied  myself  all  but  bare  necessities  in  order 
to  keep  this  down  to  a  small  sum,  while  at  the  same 
time  I  personally  turned  in  from  time  to  time  to  our 


210         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

joint  account  such  money  as  I  could  spare,  an  account 
of  which  was  kept  in  our  construction  books.  My 
drawing  account  was  nominally  $500.00  a  month,  but 
I  turned  it  all  back  for  a  year  or  more,  then  half  of  it, 
so  that  in  that  way  I  turned  in  something  like  $15.000 
or  a  little  over  $400.00  less  than  I  drew  out.  Until 
therefore,  our  profit  in  stock  as  above  noted  is  divided, 
I  will  have  received  only  the  $400.00  referred  to  as 
the  requital  for  my  part  of  the  work  in  producing  for 
our  joint  account  the  profit  of  over  a  million  and  a 
half  dollars,  as  will  be  shown  later  on.  After  our 
companies  were  in  operation,  I  ceased  availing  myself 
entirely  of  the  drawing  account  which  had  been  avail- 
able to  me  from  the  partnership  estate,  and  I  there- 
after drew  a  small  salary  for  living  expenses  from  the 
parent  power  company  as  its  president  and  chief  en- 
gineer. This  was  in  no  sense  adequate  for  the  service 
rendered  nor  was  it  so  considered,  but  I  looked  rather 
for  my  reward  to  the  income  I  would  be  able  to  make 
the  stock  yield,  half  of  which  was  mine.  Although  I 
also  was  the  President  and  Manager  of  the  Seattle 
Cataract  Company,  the  Manager  and  Chief  Engineer 
of  the  White  River  Company,  which  absorbed  my  best 
skill  and  energy,  and  the  managing  director  of  the 
Tacoma  Cataract  Company,  yet  I  never  at  any  time 
drew  a  cent  from  them  for  services  or  for  managing 
our  private  properties,  such  as  the  Baker  Block  in 
Seattle.  Father  drew  large  sums  in  cash,  bonds  and 
notes  from  time  to  time  which  were  charged  to  him 
in  the  same  books  where  the  account  with  me  was 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  211 

kept,  all  of  which  was  in  accord  with  our  mutual 
agreement.  Our  main  profit  was  the  fortune  in  Power 
Company  shares,  but  as  a  byproduct  of  the  enterprise 
we  owned  the  Baker  Building,  a  business  block  in 
Seattle  which  we  originally  built  for  a  substation 
that  proved  inadequate  and  which  I  afterwards  sold 
at  a  profit  of  $80,000  cash  or  100  per  cent  upon  our 
investment  running  six  years.  In  addition  to  this 
profit  we  had  enjoyed  the  yearly  returns  in  rentals 
from  the  building  of  about  15  per  cent  net,  and  this 
we  turned  in  on  the  Snoqualmie  construction  oper- 
ations. 

The  several  constituent  companies  mentioned  above 
were  devised  by  me  and  approved  by  Father,  as  a 
necessary  and  convenient  expedient  for  handling  our 
business  to  its  best  advantage,  and  for  maintaining 
separate  entities  in  Seattle  and  Tacoma,  where  the  re- 
spective city  councils  sought  to  enact  franchise  re- 
quirements by  which  each  town  could  dictate  the  pro- 
gram of  our  operations  in  the  other.  Later  these  dif- 
ficulties were  removed,  so  that  we  then  found  it  of 
advantage  to  put  all  our  companies  together  as  one 
company.  To  obtain  the  results  shown,  cost  me  not 
only  my  best  skill,  energy,  patience,  and  hard  work 
during  the  several  years  of  our  partnership  period,  but 
the  more  or  less  attention  I  had  given  to  it  during  the 
ten  years  preceding  our  partnership  relation,  making 
a  total  period  of  about  eighteen  years,  and  the  best 
eighteen  years  of  my  lifetime. 

Agreeable  to  our  mutual  agreement,  I  personally 


212         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

planned  and  supervised  the  work  and  the  spending  of 
the  money.  I  gave  this  one  thing  all  my  time, — days, 
nights  and  Sundays — to  the  exclusion  of  other  work 
and  other  opportunities.  "Sundays"  is  meant  lit- 
erally, for  not  over  ten  of  them  in  five  years  was  I 
able  to  take  from  the  work  and  give  to  my  family.  I 
was  always  in  possession  of  the  partnership  property 
and  the  designs  and  secrets  relating  thereto.  I  held 
my  father's  general  power  of  attorney  for  use  in  our 
joint  matters,  and  under  it  I  made  contracts  and 
incurred  indebtedness  in  his  name  and  in  his 
behalf  as  the  financial  partner.  I  carried  all 
the  property  in  his  name,  did  the  construction 
and  kept  the  books  on  account  likewise  in  his 
name  and  with  his  consent.  I  deemed  it  best  for 
his  credit  and  that  of  our  enterprise  to  do  so.  At  my 
instance  the  Snoqualmie  plant  prior  to  its  completion 
was  transferred  by  Father  to  the  Company  which  I 
had  organized  to  receive  it,  for  the  consideration  of 
$1,100,000,  which  was  paid  to  him  with  its  capital 
stock,  $500,000  and  its  first  bond  issue,  $600,000. 
These  bonds  and  those  issued  subsequently  in  addi- 
tion thereto,  represented  the  cost  of  the  enterprise 
while  the  stock  represented  our  profit.  This  transfer 
I  made  myself  by  his  power  of  attorney,  and  the 
securities  resulting  from  this  step  of  my  plans,  I  de- 
livered to  him  for  temporary  use  in  connection  with 
the  partnership,  and  for  later  division  between  us  in  ac- 
cordance with  out  partnership  understanding.  By 
agreement  between  us,  Father  carried  my  stock  as  well 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  213 

as  his  own,  in  his  name,  for  the  purpose  of  increasing 
his  financial  credit  while  financing  our  operations,  and 
to  more  conveniently  and  safely  conduct  the  financing, 
and  to  use  the  stock  as  collateral  in  connection  with 
our  matters  when  necessary.  In  this  way  he  held  all 
our  stock  and  bonds  and  our  Seattle  business  block 
as  trustee  for  us  both,  and  to  use  the  same  for  our 
mutual  benefit  and  to  later  divide  between  us,  when 
our  work  should  have  been  finally  accomplished.  The 
stock  of  the  two  Cataract  companies  however  we 
actually  did  divide,  as  its  value  was  only  nominal,  and 
it  was  useless  as  a  basis  of  credit  for  the  reason  that 
we  issued  bonds  against  these  subsidiary  companies 
for  the  full  amount  of  their  cost.  I  kept  my  Cataract 
companies  shares  in  Seattle  while  he  kept  his  in  Chi- 
cago, although  his  administrators  took  possession  of 
my  stock  without  my  consent. 

As  we  came  near  to  the  goal  to  which  we  had  been 
striving  for  several  years,  I  naturally  enough  desired 
a  division  of  our  securities,  so  that  I  would  have  actual 
possession  of  my  share  of  the  same  as  a  basis  for  my 
own  credit  and  for  my  personal  enjoyment.  I  there- 
fore asked  Father  in  the  Spring  of  1903  to  let  me  have 
my  interest  in  the  shares  and  real  estate  in  my  own 
hands,  but  he  answered  that  he  felt  that  we  were  not 
yet  "out  of  the  woods"  and  that  he  had  better  still  hold 
it  all  until  our  refunding  plan  then  under  way  had 
been  consummated.  "Can't  you  trust  me?"  he  said. 
He  seemed  to  feel  hurt,  in  that  my  insistance  implied 
a  lack  of  confidence  in  the  trust  I  had  imposed  in  him, 


214         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

— my  own  father — so  with  his  positive  promise  to 
divide  with  me  as  soon  as  it  would  be  safe  to  do  so,  I 
allowed  the  matter  to  rest  until  all  uncertainties  would 
be  removed ;  but  a  few  months  later  his  death  delayed 
temporarily  the  fulfillment  of  his  promise,  so  that  my 
shares  so  dearly  earned,  have  never  yet  reached  my 
hands,  but  have  since  been  used  against  me  to  ac- 
complish the  temporary  separation  of  myself  from  the 
management  of  my  property  and  the  levying  of  jobs 
upon  it.  Following  Father's  death  I  demanded  of  his 
administrators  the  fulfillment  of  his  stewardship  to 
me  which  resulted  in  $50,000  being  offered  me  at  one 
time  as  a  compromise,  and  10  per  cent  of  the  Power 
Company  common  stock  at  another  time,  both  of 
which  I  declined,  as  they  were  but  a  fraction  of  what 
was  mine.  An  adjustment  was  promised  from  time 
to  time; — but  these  promises  with  which  I  was  cod- 
dled along  during  the  year  of  probate  were  not  kept 
and  ended  in  their  telling  me  to  sue,  so  that  on  the  last 
day  of  the  probate  year  I  was  compelled  to  bring  a 
suit  for  the  determination  of  my  interest  in  our 
western  properties  and  the  segregation  of  my  estate 
from  that  of  my  father's.  My  friend  and  champion 
in  this  matter  has  been  the  distinguished  lawyer  the 
Hon.  James  Hamilton  Lewis,  of  Chicago,* to  whose 
learning,  ability  and  skill,  and  that  of  his  able  asso- 
ciate Mr.  E.  N.  Zoline,  the  final  triumph  of  my 
cause  will  be  largely  due.  When  the  matter  was 
finally  referred  to  an  attorney  with  the  idea  of  arrang- 
ing a  compromise  settlement  of  my  interest  in  order 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  215 

to  avoid  the  notoriety  due  to  legal  proceedings,  the  at- 
torney in  question  advised  that  nothing  be  paid  to  me 
in  requital  for  what  I  had  done  and  that  no  part  of  the 
$15,000  which  I  had  invested  in  it  be  returned  to  me, 
and  the  adoption  of  his  advice  of  course,  has  since  pro- 
vided an  ample  living  for  him  as  the  result  of  the  thou- 
sands of  dollars  which  he  is  annually  charging  against 
the  estate  in  the  carrying  out  of  this  program,  and 
which  he  will  continue  so  to  do  as  long  as  there  is  any- 
thing to  litigate  about  or  with,  for  this  is  the  ex- 
pressed intention.  It  was  thought  by  those  who  op- 
posed me,  that  I  had  no  other  resource  except  my 
interest  in  the  power  company,  and  that  with  this 
stripped  from  me  I  would  be  unable  to  litigate  for  pos- 
session of  my  property  through  such  a  long  period  of 
time  as  the  administrators  with  ample  funds  at  their 
command  would  be  able  to  carry  it,  and  the  fact  that 
I  have  done  so  three  years  already  has  been  a  source 
of  much  perplexity  to  them. 

The  final  refusal  to  recognize  my  interest  was 
based  upon  the  technical  contention  that  I  had  ne- 
glected to  have  the  contract  with  my  father  in  writing, 
and  so  as  a  penalty  I  would  have  to  forfeit  to  his  heirs 
my  half  of  our  property,  representing  my  invention  of 
the  project  itself  as  well  as  all  the  fruits  of  my  years 
of  labor  and  industry  and  devotion  to  our  work  and 
the  $15,000  I  had  in  it  in  cash.  It  is  also  contended 
that  I  did  not  bring  my  suit  within  the  time  required 
by  law,  and  that  the  $400  portion  of  my  drawing  ac- 
count which  I  had  not  yet  paid  back,  paid  me  in  full 


216         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

for  all  my  years  of  strenuous  work  and  for  my  inven- 
tions which  this  chapter  sets  forth.  Not  even  a  vote  of 
'thanks  has  been  received  from  those  who  seek  enrich- 
ment at  my  hands  and  who  in  comfortable  inaction 
have  done  nothing  of  consequence  during  the  long 
and  strenuous  period  while  I  upon  the  frontier  was 
engaged  in  carving  the  Snoqualmie  fortune  out  of 
the  wilderness  and  defending  it  against  the  assaults 
of  envy  and  greed.  Never  before  in  my  knowledge 
has  it  been  expected  of  any  man  to  give  the  inventions 
of  years  of  careful  thought  to  any  one  without  a  dol- 
lar of  compensation.  Such  an  idea  is  unprecedented 
in  the  history  of  industrial  development  and  scientific 
progress,  and  the  world  would  stand  still  if  it  were 
the  rule  to  put  upon  man's  achievements  such  a  ban. 
No  man  ever  works  for  another  for  any  salary  alone 
as  I  worked  in  this  business.  No  man  sacrifices  abso- 
lutely all  other  prospects,  mortgages  his  brains  to  one 
thing,  gives  up  all  thoughts  of  any  other  future, 
impairs  his  health,  strength  and  vitality,  and  suffers 
the  nightmares  and  man  killing  nerve  strain  such  as 
I  have  done,  for  any  salaried  compensation  in  money 
whatsoever,  and  much  less  would  any  man  perform 
such  a  service  covering  a  strenuous  five  years  for  the 
few  dollars  which  I  drew  out  of  it  for  the  mere  pur- 
pose of  keeping  body  and  soul  together.  Father  him- 
self would  have  been  the  last  man  in  the  world  to  be 
a  party  to  such  injustice.  Half  of  that  time  I  was 
away  from  home  and  many  nights  there  was  more 
work  than  sleep  and  only  about  ten  Sundays  in  five 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  217 

years  have  I  been  able  to  be  home,  for  that  was  my 
day  almost  invariably  to  be  on  the  work  in  the  moun- 
tains. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  at  this  point  the  parallel 
situation  of  my  brother  Howard  whom  Father  had 
backed  heavily  for  a  large  interest  in  Butler  Brothers'. 
The  administrators  made  no  claim  upon  this  property 
as  belonging  to  the  estate,  although  Father's  liability 
in  connection  therewith  was  in  force  at  the  time  of  his 
death.  The  principal  difference  appears  to  be  that 
Howard  fortunately  had  his  Butler  Brothers'  property 
in  his  own  hands  when  Father  died,  while  my  Sno- 
qualmie  property  was  still  in  Father's  custody  at  the 
time  of  his  unfortunate  death.  The  legal  status  of  the 
two  cases  is  similar,  and  both  situations  involved 
Father  in  the  purpose  of  helping  each  of  us  in  our 
particular  lines.  There  was  no  thought  that  either 
of  us  should  work  out  a  fortune  for  the  rest  of  the 
family  and  other  relatives.  It  is  quite  likely  that  if 
"Charley  Baker's  Folly"  had  lived  up  to  its  misnomer, 
I  would  have  been  left  unmolested  in  my  possession  of  it. 

Although  the  absence  of  a  written  contract  has 
been  made  much  of  by  those  who  seek  to  acquire  my 
interest  in  the  property  which  I  created,  yet  the  exist- 
ence of  the  partnership  relation  was  well  known  to 
many  of  Father's  friends  to  whom  he  stated  it  and 
who  have  made  affidavits  to  that  effect  and  the  fre- 
quent references  to  our  joint  properties  in  his  let- 
ters to  me  very  clearly  bear  it  out.  In  this  connec- 


218         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

tion  it  may  be  interesting  for  me  to  quote  from  several 
of  his  letters  to  me  as  follows : 

Aug.  31,  1898.  "In  the  first  place,  we  do  not  want  any 
partners  if  we  can  help  it. —  — Of  course  17  years  is  quite  a 
long  time,  and  may  be  as  long  as  we  shall  be  in  business,  but 
if  we  should  want  to  sell  the  property,  the  length  of  franchise 
would  be  an  important  element  in  fixing  values. — 

Mar.  6,  1899.  ''You  may  be  right  on  the  auxiliary  com- 
pany business  if  it  ever  comes  to  that;  however,  we  must 
retain  not  one-half  but  a  majority." 

Mar.  13,  1899.  "I  am  unable  to  see  from  what  you  have 
written  what  advantage  it  can  be  to  us.  I  do  not,  however, 
think  it  wise  to  let  anybody  know  that  we  have  control  even 
temporarily  of  the  White  River  scheme. 1  see  by  the  clip- 
ping you  sent  that  others  are  looking  out  for  power  locations ; 
/  wonder  why  some  of  them  don't  offer  to  buy  us  out." 

Aug.  23,  1901.  "I  do  not  know  exactly  whether  it  will  be 
advisable  to  let  Stone  &  Webster  know  zve  have  bought  the 
White  River.  What  do  you  think?" 

Mar.  25,  1902.  "When  Mr.  Hill  was  here  he  talked  as  if 
he  would  buy  or  sell.  What  do  you  suppose  he  would  pay  for 
our  plant?" 

June  5,  1902.  "Maybe  Sam  Hill  will  call  on  me  when  he 
comes  East,  but  I  have  no  particular  desire  to  see  him.  7 
presume  he  ivants  to  sell,  and  not  to  buy  us  out." 

June  30,  1902.  "I  told  him  (Hill)  the  same  as  you  did, 
that  we  could  not  go  into  a  consolidation  on  the  5%  basis 
while  we  had  our  development  incomplete." 

Dec.  17,  1902.  "Now  Henry  comes  down  on  me  with  a 
proposition  to  buy  the  'Commercial-West.'  I  do  not  know 
but  he  has  already  done  it,  on  the  expectation  that  I  am  to  put 
up  the  money.  I  have  never  put  up  anything  for  either  Bertha 
or  Henry  as  I  have  for  you  and  Howard." 

Mar.   16,   1903.     "Their  proposition    (Stone  &   Webster) 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  219 

was  to  increase  their  preferred  stock  to  $1,500,000  and  pay  us 
the  additional  $500,000  even  up  for  our  Snoqualmie  stock." 

May  19,  1903.  "If  we  could  get  legal  possession  of  our 
White  River  property,  I  should  want  to  sell  the  building  and 
use  the  money  for  development,  but  that  appears  to  be  as  far 
away  as  ever.  If  the  court  had  not  made  up  its  mind  to  beat 
us,  he  would  not  do  us  the  injustice  of  holding  us  up  indefi- 
nitely." 

A  strong  effort  has  been  made  by  those  who  seek 
my  undoing,  to  secure  retractions  from  those  who 
made  the  affidavits  in  my  behalf,  but  this  attempt 
failed,  as  evidently  the  truth  of  yesterday  must  be  the 
truth  of  today.  I  have  been  repeatedly  slandered  to 
these  witnesses  for  the  same  purpose,  and  a  syste- 
matic crusade  against  my  credit  has  been  continually 
waged  in  the  belief  that  thus  undermined  I  would  be 
unable  to  carry  my  end  of  this  expensive  litigation 
with  the  entire  exchequer  of  the  administrators 
opposed  to  me. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  at  this  point,  that  three 
years  after  Father's  death,  the  administrators  and 
present  managers  had  secretly  arranged  to  sell  both 
Father's  and  my  stock  to  our  competitors,  who  had 
never  ceased  wanting  to  own  our  company,  and  this 
was  to  be  done  without  consulting  me  in  the  matter. 
However,  the  intending  purchasers,  with  business 
caution,  had  their  lawyers  review  the  situation  as  to 
its  legal  aspects,  with  the  result  that  they  insisted  that 
my  relinquishment  would  be  necessary  in  order  to 
gain  the  title.  This  of  course  made  a  little  stir,  as 
my  claims  had  been  very  lightly  regarded.  I  was  then 


220         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

made  aware  that  considerable  money  would  be  paid 
me  and  I  would  be  retained  to  complete  my  building 
of  the  White  River  plant  if  I  would  consent  to  the 
selling  out  or  consolidation,  and  if  I  did  not  do  so  they 
would  thereafter  withhold  dividends  from  the  stock- 
holders. I  however  told  them  that  persuasion  of  this 
sort  did  not  interest  me,  that  I  had  no  wish  to  make 
money  at  the  expense  of  the  stockholders,  and  that 
my  consent  would  be  forthcoming  only  upon  the  cor- 
rection of  wrongs  done  to  certain  stockholders  whom 
I  had  interested  in  the  company,  and  the  restitution  to 
the  company  of  certain  private  and  illegal  profits 
which  the  president  and  some  of  the  directors  had 
made  at  the  expense  of  the  stockholders,  and  there  the 
matter  has  since  rested. 

The  death  of  my  father  was  a  staggering  blow  to 
me  and  to  our  enterprise,  for  our  work  was  not  yet 
entirely  done,  and  the  bulk  of  his  part  of  it — the  final 
financing — was  yet  entirely  to  be  done.  I  estimate 
that  three-fourths  of  a  million  dollars  would  not  cover 
the  subsequent  damage  to  our  property  due  to  the 
recklessness,,  incompetency  and  trickery  of  those  who 
by  the  accident  of  his  death  became  a  vampire  at  the 
throat  of  the  project.  The  enterprise  could  no  longer 
have  the  support  which  his  credit  gave  it.  His  burden 
I  then  had  to  take  up  in  addition  to  my  own.  I 
immediately  went  to  Mr.  George  Westinghouse,  who 
had  been  Father's  friend  as  well  as  my  own,  and  after 
explaining  my  situation,  asked  him  to  authorize  his 
company  to  extend  a  credit  to  our  company  ofi$  100,000 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  221 

for  at  least  a  year.  This  he  gladly  did.  I  next  went 
to  the  Aluminum  Company  and  asked  them  to  do 
the  same  for  about  $50,000,  and  the  Waterwheel  Com- 
pany for  about  $35,000,  which  they  both  did.  This 
was  necessary,  for  prior  to  his  death  we  had  under- 
taken the  doubling  of  the  waterwheel  and  generator 
capacity  of  the  plant  and  also  the  aluminum  trans- 
mission system.  Then  after  the  administrators  of 
Father's  estate  found  themselves  unable  to  borrow  any 
money  for  current  needs  of  the  company,  I  went  to 
Tacoma  and  upon  the  recommendation  of  my  friend, 
Mr.  George  Browne,  there,  I  was  able  to  borrow  for 
the  company  from  the  Fidelity  Bank  of  which  he  was 
a  director,  $26,000.  It  was  necessary  for  me  to 
endorse  this  note  personally  in  order  to  get  the  loan, 
which  of  course  I  did  not  hesitate  to  do  on  account 
of  being  the  company's  sponsor  and  a  half  owner  in 
it.  I  asked  the  other  heirs  to  endorse  this  note  with 
me  on  account  of  their  prospective  inheritance  from 
Father's  share  in  the  company,  but  they  thought  the 
risk  too  great  and  preferred  to  let  it  rest  upon  me 
alone.  As  a  further  means  of  raising  ready  cash, 
I  persuaded  the  Tacoma  Smelter,  our  largest  cus- 
tomer, to  pay  up  its  bill  for  power  one  year  in  advance, 
which  meant  another  $12,000. 

Shortly  after  making  these  temporary  financial 
arrangements  I  consolidated  our  four  companies  into 
one  at  values  which  competent  judges  had  appraised 
them  at,  and  called  it  Snoqualmie  Falls  &  White  River 
Power  Company,  capitalized  at  $3,000,000,  for  the 


222         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

properties  had  become  very  valuable  by  this  time  and 
were  well  worth  that  sum.  The  name  was  later 
changed  to  the  one  it  now  carries,  viz.,  Seattle-Tacoma 
Power  Company,  and  the  Company  was  then  recapi- 
talized as  follows : — 

$1,250,000  6  per  cent  Preferred  Stock, 
2,250,000  Common  Stock, 


Total,  $3,500,000  Capital  Stock. 

This  completed  the  plan  we  had  been  working  on  sev- 
eral months  prior  to  Father's  death  but  which  had 
been  temporarily  held  up  by  Stone  &  Webster's  attack 
on  our  White  River  Company.  This  consolidated 
company  created  a  mortgage  of  $7,500,000  upon  all 
its  property,  under  which  it  issued  $^500,000  of 
bonds,  which  were  sold  to  N.  W.  Harris  £  Company 
under  a  contract  which  I  made  with  them  for  their 
purchase,  but  which  they  repudiated  a  few  months 
after.  A  popular  conundrum  which  wore  itself 
threadbare  for  about  a  year  in  the  Power  Company 
office  was:  "When  is  a  contract  not  a  contract?" 
Answer:  "When  it  is  made  with  Harris  &  Company." 
A  year  later,  however,  they  again  agreed  with  the 
administrators  to  purchase  the  bonds  at  the  same  price 
(92),  and  this  time  they  carried  out  their  contract, 
upon  a  more  favorable  basis  to  them.  They  had  in  the 
interval  loaned  the  estate  $475,000  which  was  paid 
up  when  the  bonds  were  finally  taken  by  them.  The 
administrators  gave  them  a  one-seventh  interest  in 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  223 

the  Company  as  a  present  at  the  time  this  loan  was 
made,  and  the  loan  was  secured  by  a  pledge  of  the 
entire  estate.  These  bonds  refunded  all  previous 
issues  of  parent  and  subsidiary  companies,  and  pro- 
vided for  doubling  the  capacity  of  the  plant  at  the 
Falls  and  the  transmission  system,  as  well  as  extend- 
ing the  system  in  Seattle  and  Tacoma.  Since  my 
departure  from  the  Company  contemporaneously  with 
the  purchase  of  this  issue  of  bonds  as  hereafter  related, 
additional  bonds  have  been  issued  for  extending  the 
system,  and  to  enable  the  new  president  and  some  of 
the  directors  to  privately  speculate  in  an  ice  factory 
which  they  unloaded  on  the  Company,  at  an  expense 
of  $380,000.  The  total  bonds  issued  represent  the 
cost  of  the  enterprise  as  a  whole  and  the  stock  our 
profit. 

While  my  negotiations  with  the  Harris  firm  were 
pending  I  took  advantage  of  a  waiting  interval  to  go 
to  New  York  to  develop  two  other  lines  which  I  had 
previously  begun  by  correspondence  with  the  aid  of 
the  Westinghouse  Company.  While  in  New  York  I 
was  actually  offered  a  syndicate  arrangement  for  buy- 
ing up  my  father's  interest  in  the  Company  but  T  did 
not  favor  this  as  I  wished  to  have  Father's  heirs  con- 
tinue in  the  Company  and  enjoy  the  profit  which  I 
believed  they  would  realize  in  so  doing.  I  also  secured 
a  bid  of  90  for  our  bonds  without  any  sweetening  and 
conditioned  that  I  would  remain  with  the  Company 
as  its  Manager  and  would  have  my  life  insured  for 
the  benefit  of  the  Company  for  the  sum  of  $200,000, 


224         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

as  the  New  York  bankers  naturally  felt  that  I  was  the 
chief  asset  of  the  Company.  The  bid  of  Harris  & 
Company  was  promised  at  about  this  time,  so  I  intro- 
duced the  administrators  to  them  by  letter  and  asked 
them  to  get  it  for  me  and  advise  me  by  wire.  They 
wired  that  92  was  offered  and  I,  therefore,  terminated 
my  negotiations  in  New  York  with  the  explanation 
that  Harris  &  Company  had  made  a  better  price  and 
secured  the  business.  The  one-seventh  interest  in  the 
Company,  however,  as  a  present  exacted  by  Harris 
was  a  later  development,  but  as  I  had  burned  our 
bridges  behind  us  in  New  York  there  was  nothing  to 
do  except  to  submit  to  any  revised  terms  which 
Harris  might  then  demand  and  the  administrators 
agree  to. 

Much  has  been  said  and  written  about  this  Sno- 
qualmie  Falls  power  plant,  so  absolutely  unique,  and 
standing  alone  as  it  does  in  the  annals  of  Hydro- 
Electric  Engineering.  Housed  in  a  great  cavern  hol- 
lowed out  of  the  rock  300  feet  under  ground,  it  is  the 
only  naturally  fireproof  and  earthquake  proof  plant 
extant.  Scientists,  public  men  and  managers  have 
come  from  all  parts  of  the  world  to  see  its  wondrous 
stupendousness,  and  withal  simplicity.  I  entertained 
at  different  times  such  visitors  as  Mr.  M.  LeBaudy,  of 
Paris,  Baron  Von  Ketler,  General  in  Chief  of  the 
German  Army,  Admiral  Schley,  of  Spanish  War 
fame,  and  the  Commercial  Club  of  Chicago,  sometimes 
called  the  "Billionaire  Club."  General  Von  Ketler, 
who  was  closing  a  tour  of  the  world  at  the  time,  pro- 


CENTENNIAL   MILL,   OPERATED  BY    SNOQUALMIE   POWER. 


WHITE  RIVER   POWER   PLANT,   60,000   H.P. 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  225 

nounced  it  the  greatest  work  he  had  seen.  The  Com- 
mercial Club  which  visited  the  power  plant  at  Sno- 
qualmie  Falls  upon  its  10,000  mile  tour  around  the 
country  were  so  impressed  by  what  they  saw — and 
it  was  not  then  completed — that  their  opinion  very 
freely  expressed  was  that  this  plant  was  the  only  fea- 
ture of  their  entire  itinerary  that  rivalled  in  interest 
the  sublime  Grand  Canyon  of  the  Colorado  River. 
They  wanted  to  buy  it.  President  McKinley  planned 
to  visit  this  plant  and  plant  a  tree  there,  but  was 
deterred  by  the  illness  of  his  wife,  while  President 
Roosevelt  had  the  same  expectation  but  was  deterred 
by  the  local  politicians  who  preferred  to  arrange  some 
other  program  for  his  entertainment. 

III. 

(Several  names  used  in  this  section  are  fictitious  and  are 
designated  A,  B,  C,  etc.,  for  convenience,  in  place  of  the 
real  names  which  the  characters  bear.) 

So  much  for  a  brief  recital  of  the  results  obtained 
through  our  relation  as  partners  in  this  enterprise. 
The  dramatic  part  of  the  story,  however,  running 
parallel  with  the  rest  of  it,  is  not  told  in  the  busy 
water  wheels,  the  raging  river,  the  humming  motors 
thirty  to  fifty  miles  away,  or  the  dividends  earned, 
but  is  reflected  in  the  nightmares  and  sleepless  nights, 
the  worries,  the  sickness,  the  heartache,  and  tre- 
mendous expenditure  of  mind  force,  nerve  force, 
patience  and  energy,  which  only  we  two  knew  about 
in  its  fullness  and  acuteness,  and  which  only  we  two 


226         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

endured  as  a  part  of  our  contribution  to  the  achieve- 
ment ;  none  of  which  a  stranger  would  ever  dream  of 
as  he  looked  upon  the  finished  work. 

Our  enterprise  had  been  for  a  short  time  after  its 
birth,  serenely  jogging  along  as  a  young  infant  that 
had  come  into  the  world  with  much  acclaim  of  joy 
from  the  people  who  looked  upon  it  as  their  future 
deliverer  from  extortionate  prices  for  light  and  power. 
The  whole  Puget  Sound  country  looked  upon  it  as  a 
future  benefit  to  their  communities.  But  suddenly  in  its 
pathway,  this  promising  infant  soon  met  face  to  face  a 
giant  conspiracy  to  kill  it  which  was  engineered  by 
and  for  the  benefit  of  the  E.  Company,  one  of  the 
largest  of  American  electrical  companies,  M.  &  N., 
and  a  number  of  thieves  and  grafters  in  Seattle  and 
Tacoma.  This  drew  us  into  a  war  for  the  defence  of 
our  property,  which  lasted  five  long  years  and  is  with- 
out a  parallel  in  the  history  of  similar  enterprises. 

Father  and  I  started  out  upon  this  enterprise  upon 
the  theory  that  it  would  be  a  popular  project  in  Seattle 
and  Tacoma.  It  was  indeed  popular  among  the  people 
at  large  who  had  been  paying  high  rates  for  lighting 
and  power,  and  who  had  been  riding  on  street  car  sys- 
tems whose  poor  service  was  due  as  much  as  anything 
to  inadequate  and  uncertain  power.  There  was  every 
reason,  therefore,  for  the  public  to  herald  our  coming 
with  approbation,  enthusiasm  and  pleasure,  but  never- 
theless we  invoked  by  our  operations  the  opposition 
and  emnity  of  those  mentioned.  Very  soon  after  we 
had  begun  our  construction  operations,  the  E.  Com- 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  227 

pany  began  a  most  hostile  warfare  upon  us,  as  a 
means  of  securing  by  compulsion  our  orders  for  elec- 
trical machinery  and  for  the  purpose  of  wrecking  us 
afterwards; — that  is  to  hammer  us  with  threats,  and 
injure  us  as  they  could  until  we  would  yield  to  the 
purchase  of  machinery  from  them  without  considering 
other  concerns  which  might  wish  to  compete  for  the 
same.  Mr.  A.  noted  for  his  cunning,  was  their  prin- 
cipal agent  in  the  Puget  Sound  country,  and  he  was 
ably  assisted  by  two  lawyers,  Mr.  B.  in  Tacoma  and 
Mr.  C.  in  Seattle.  They  devised  an  opposition  com- 
pany, proposing  to  utilize  the  power  of  a  neighboring 
creek  for  the  purpose  of  drawing  the  public  favor 
from  us  to  themselves  and  for  the  apparent  purpose 
of  diverting  prospective  revenue  from  us  to  them. 
This  company  was  on  paper  only,  and  never  came  to 
actual  realization,  but  it  had  its  use  for  the  time  being 
as  a  club  for  the  purposes  intended  and  for  bedevilling 
us  generally. 

Negotiations  were  begun  both  in  Seattle  and  Chi- 
cago with  the  E.  Company  and  the  Westinghouse 
Company  for  our  electrical  apparatus.  As  soon  as 
the  plans  for  the  construction  of  the  Snoqualmie  plant 
were  definitely  settled  upon,  I  went  East  for  the  pur- 
pose of  placing  the  orders  for  the  electrical  machinery, 
transmission  wires,  insulators,  etc.  Bids  had  already 
been  filed  to  cover  these  and  Father  had  practically 
promised  the  contracts  on  the  tenders  made.  I  how- 
ever, proceeded  to  the  different  factories  represented, 
negotiated  the  business  anew,  and  made  these  con- 


228         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

tracts  myself  at  a  total  saving  to  us  of  over  thirty  thou- 
sand dollars  less  than  the  prices  bid.  This  was  the  first 
order  of  any  size  on  the  boards  in  the  United  States  since 
the  panic,  and  there  was  therefore  most  ardent  com- 
petition for  it  among  the  manufacturers  of  apparatus 
and  supplies  such  as  we  were  in  the  market  for.  We 
commanded  ample  money  for  the  purchase  of  what  we 
needed,  and  we  desired  the  best  goods  in  return  there- 
for. We  asked  no  one  to  take  our  bonds  in  payment, 
not  to  extend  us  credit.  We  wanted  the  best  that  cash 
could  buy. 

Mr.  A.'s  plan  was  to  drive  us  into  buying  from  his 
company,  regardless  of  any  views  we  had  on  the  sub- 
ject. I  finally  however  contracted  to  purchase  our 
electrical  apparatus  from  the  Westinghouse  Company 
at  slightly  higher  prices  than  the  E.  Co.  (which  we 
concluded  would  be  an  unsafe  alliance)  had  offered, 
and  this  deal  carried  with  it  the  option  to  purchase  the 
stock  of  the  White  River  Company  heretofore  referred 
to  in  this  narrative.  This  precipitated  a  great  war 
upon  us,  which  was  intensified  by  the  ill  feeling  the 
E.  Company  had  always  had  for  me  personally  because 
of  my  previously  winning  certain  electrical  contracts 
which  they  had  expected  to  get.  They  had  pre- 
empted the  Puget  Sound  country  as  their  particular 
pasture  with  the  idea  that  they  held  a  divine  title 
thereto,  and  my  presuming  to  make  a  living  at  their 
disadvantage  was  regarded  by  them  as  a  piece  of 
ambitious  impudence  which  could  not  be  forgiven  nor 
forgotten. 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  229 

The  warfare  to  which  my  father  and  I  were  sub- 
jected as  a  result  of  our  operations  was  conducted 
against  us  with  the  skill  and  determination  of  an  army 
general.  They  still  hoped  to  upset  our  contract  with 
the  Westinghouse  Company.  Their  idea  was  to 
attack  our  project  at  every  turn,  to  knock  the  props 
from  under  it,  and  by  a  protracted  system  of  bluster 
and  bulldozing,  to  finally  scare  us  into  repudiating 
with  Westinghouse  and  making  a  contract  for  our 
machinery  with  the  E.  Company.  Mr.  A.  then 
revealed  their  purpose  of  developing  the  power  of  the 
neighboring  creek  in  opposition  to  us,  unless  we 
bought  machinery  from  them  and  consolidated  with 
them.  We  declined  to  consolidate  our  material  project 
with  their  mvth. 

tt 

The  next  point  of  attack  against  us  was  in  the 
matter  of  franchises  which  they  proclaimed  we  could 
not  get  in  either  town  without  their  co-operation  and 
consent.  They  had  their  spies  abroad,  and  every  word 
that  I  uttered  in  the  committee  conferences  of  the  city 
councils  was  promptly  repeated  to  their  headquarters 
in  the  East.  In  the  beginning,  our  project  was 
regarded  as  a  boon  to  the  two  cities.  Under  the  tac- 
tics employed  the  City  Councils  were  led  to  believe 
that  we  were  the  public  enemy.  The  conspiracy  was 
not  only  local,  but  the  campaign  of  threats  and  misrep- 
resentations was  carried  on  in  Chicago  at  the  same 
time.  My  father  in  Chicago  was  finally  peremptorily 
informed  by  the  E.  Company  that  if  I  did  not  come 
East  at  once  and  arrange  matters  to  their  satisfaction 


230         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

"we  would  have  to  take  the  consequences."  I  did  not 
obey.  Like  ubiquitous  highwaymen  they  always 
struck  from  behind  and  in  the  dark,  so  that  our  imagi- 
nations were  constantly  taxed  to  divine  their  next 
move. 

It  was  early  in  the  history  of  the  conspiracy  that 
the  E.  Company  employed  the  before  mentioned 
whisker-begrimed  elfin  lawyer-man  of  versatile 
speech  from  Seattle,  named  C.,  who  went  East  and 
called  upon  my  father,  threatening  annihilation  of 
our  project  if  we  did  not  come  to  terms  with  the  E. 
Company.  Father  rebuked  him  for  his  impudence 
and  ordered  him  out  of  his  office.  His  opinion  of  him 
is  clearly  enough  defined  in  his  letters  to  me  from 
which  I  quote: 

May  14,  1898.  "In  view  of  my  talk  with  — ,  you 

had  better  give  it  out  that  you  are  likely  to  start  East  in  a 
few  days;  they  may  have  somebody,  C,  perhaps,  on  the  look- 
out, and  he  is  just  the  sort  of  a  fellow  who  would  lend  himself 
to  buying  a  common  council." 

June  17,  1898.  "Your  interview  in  the  paper  indicates 
that  you  are  not  afraid  to  have  C  know  why  you  delay  coming 
East.  I  am  more  afraid  of  him  than  of  A." 

We  therefore  had  C.  on  our  list  as  one  to  avoid, 
but  his  grasshopper  antics  were  always  to  me  more 
a  source  of  amusement  than  of  apprehension. 

One  of  their  first  moves  was  to  attack  the  title  to 
our  property  at  Snoqualmie  Falls,  using  for  this  pur- 
pose the  Northern  Pacific  Railroad  as  a  tool,  Mr.  B. 
being  attorney  for  that  railroad  as  well  as  for  our 
opponent.  He  caused  the  railroad  company  to  make 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  231 

a  demand  upon  us  for  possession  of  the  Falls,  alleging 
that  they  held  a  prior  and  substantial  title  thereto. 
Their  contention  had  its  foundation  in  an  ancient, 
abandoned  and  obsolete  right  of  way  easement  for  a 
railroad  line  to  which  the  Northern  Pacific  fell  heir 
from  the  Seattle,  Lake  Shore  &  Eastern  Railway. 
There  was  no  foundation  for  the  claim,  and  I  soon 
after  laid  the  situation  before  President  Chas.  S. 
Mellen  of  the  Northern  Pacific,  in  St.  Paul,  who  stated 
to  me  that  "If  my  explanation  was  correct,  his  com- 
pany would  be  playing  the  part  of  a  blackmailer  in 
pursuing  it,"  and  he  therefore  ordered  an  investiga- 
tion. As  a  result  of  that  investigation,  a  quitclaim 
deed  from  that  company  was  soon  sent  to  us.  It  was 
easy  to  divine  the  purpose  of  this  latest  move  by  A. 
It  was  thought  undoubtedly  that  our  operations  had 
progressed  to  such  a  point,  that  in  order  to  go  on  with 
the  work,  the  property  would  have  to  be  bonded  and 
loans  placed  upon  it,  which  would  be  impossible  to 
do  under  a  clouded  title,  but  fortunately  we  were  not 
dependent  upon  this  property  nor  upon  any  other 
property  for  funds. 

Finally  after  several  weeks,  the  E.  Company 
offered  a  truce,  and  argeed  to  do  nothing  further 
offensive  during  my  absence  if  I  would  go  East  and 
take  up  negotiations  with  them,  but  I  did  not  go  until 
our  franchise  in  Seattle  was  granted,  and  then  I  went 
East  in  order  to  place  the  contracts  as  above  related. 
During  my  absence,  however,  A.'s  local  agents  violated 
the  pledge  and  still  kept  up  their  hostility  to  our 


232         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

project,  trying  to  break  up  power  contracts  made  with 
our  company,  stating  that  the  thousands  of  dollars  we 
were  spending  was  only  a  bluff;  stating  that  Sno- 
qualmie  Falls  ran  dry  every  summer  and  froze  solid 
in  the  winter;  stating  that  any  power  contracts  we 
made  could  not  possibly  be  carried  out ;  that  no  water 
power  had  ever  yet  successfully  driven  an  electric 
lighting  system,  although  in  the  same  breath  they 
urged  that  it  could  be  successfully  done  from  their 
neighboring  creek  owing  to  some  specially  endowed 
qualities  of  that  highly  gifted  stream.  The  threats  were 
made  continually  that  they  would  bring  vast  stores 
of  power  to  Seattle  from  the  neighboring  creek  and 
run  us  into  bankruptcy. 

The  war  against  our  Seattle  franchise  as  waged  by 
the  E.  Company  was  long  and  bitter,  and  the  usual 
unscrupulous  methods  of  that  Company  were 
employed  in  full  force.  The  public  kept  a  keen  eye 
upon  the  situation,  and  for  this  reason  their  plotting 
was  under  greater  restraint  than  would  otherwise 
have  been  the  case.  As  it  was  however,  different 
members  of  the  city  council  were  unduly  influenced, 
and  so  I  had  to  accept  a  franchise  full  of  harsh  and 
almost  unworkable  restrictions  in  place  of  the  liberal 
one  demanded  by  the  public,  and  such  an  one  as  an 
enterprise  like  ours  was  worthy  of.  Father  had 
known  something  of  the  E.  Company's  methods  before 
and  he  wrote: 

Feb.  20,  1899.  "I  have  never  doubted  the  fight  the  E.  Co. 
were  going  to  set  up  on  us,  so  could  not  share  your  optimism. 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  233 

They  are  willing  to  do  anything  to  beat  us  and  as  they  have 
started  on  bribery,  they  will  not  stop.  I  am  surprised  at  the 
price  they  are  paying  aldermen,  as  they  could  better  afford 
to  pay  ten  times  $200  per  head  than  for  us  to  get  the  franchise." 
After  their  failure  to  defeat  the  Seattle  franchise, 
the  campaign  was  shifted  bodily  to  Tacoma  under  the 
direction  of  Mr.  B.,  attorney  for  the  E.  Company,  and 
Mr.  D.,  a  professional  lobbyist.  Mr.  B.  proved  him- 
self a  better  manipulator  of  men  than  the  Seattle 
coterie  had  shown  themselves  to  be,  and  as  a  result 
the  Tacoma  Council  voted  down  the  application  for  a 
franchise  there.  The  Tacoma  Council  was  generally 
thought  to  be  owned  body,  soul  and  breeches  by  our 
enemy.  The  matter  then  rested  in  Tacoma  for  several 
months  until  public  indignation  became  aroused  and 
got  to  a  white  heat,  and  then  a  new  Council  in  that 
city  took  the  matter  up  again  for  consideration.  Now 
came  a  crisis  in  the  situation,  and  the  E.  Company 
immediately  gave  orders  to  have  the  franchise  killed, 
or  failing  in  that  to  have  it  so  loaded  down  with 
iniquity  that  I  would  decline  it.  Their  local  super- 
intendent took  active  charge  of  the  conspiracy  out- 
side of  the  Council,  and  one  of  the  Councilmen  became 
their  agent  within  it.  Between  these  two,  a  series  of 
most  ingenious  manoeuvres  were  planned,  with,  how- 
ever little  success.  Public  interest  in  the  discussion 
became  ardent,  and  prominent  citizens  filled  the  audi- 
ence chamber  at  the  meetings,  so  that  in  a  measure 
they  were  kept  at  bay.  The  Tacoma  Daily  Ledger 
then  took  up  the  fight  in  behalf  of  the  citizens,  and 
showed  up  clearly  the  attitude  of  the  E.  Company, 


234         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

and  through  its  columns  hundreds  of  citizens  entered 
their  protest  against  the  octopus  whose  tentacles  had 
been  upon  them  for  so  many  years.  This  made  the 
situation  desperate  for  the  E.  Company,  which  it  was 
said  had  put  an  active  agent  in  the  field  to  unduly 
influence  the  councilmen,  but  be  it  said  however  to 
the  credit  of  the  city,  this  plan  met  with  little  success. 
Then  sensational  articles  were  published  about  a 
gigantic  syndicate  taking  up  the  neighboring  creek 
power  company,  and  bringing  down  water  power  by 
the  many  thousands  of  horse  power  to  both  cities,  and 
about  a  galaxy  of  millionaires  buying  up  the  street 
railways  of  Tacoma  through  the  influence  of  the  E. 
Company,  but  after  a  few  days  of  telegraphing  and 
investigation  by  the  Tacoma  Daily  Ledger  these  yarns 
were  shown  to  be  fairy  stories,  invented  for  the  purpose 
of  subtracting  from  the  popular  support  accorded  to 
our  Snoqualmie  project.  All  this  in  the  end  served 
as  a  boomerang  in  favor  of  the  Snoqualmie  Company, 
so  that  the  E.  Company  was  compelled  to  yield  to  the 
wishes  of  the  citizens,  and  finally  the  council  voted 
the  franchise  into  a  law. 

As  soon  as  the  Tacoma  Franchise  was  granted  one 
of  the  principal  councilmen  wrote  me  a  letter  stating 
that  he  had  $100.00  for  investment,  and  wanted  me 
to  approach  my  father  on  the  subject  of  investing  it 
for  him  on  the  Chicago  Board  of  Trade  in  such  a 
manner  as  would  return  him  a  profit  of  $125.00  a 
month.  This  was  certainly  a  delicate  way  of  putting 
it,  but,  as  Mark  Anthony  would  have  said  of  the 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  235 

average  Tacoma  Councilmen,  "and  these  are  honor- 
able men,"  I  of  course  answered  the  communication  in 
an  equally  polite  vein  that  Father  could  not  undertake 
a  Board  of  Trade  transaction  on  so  small  a  scale  and 
that  he  could  not  in  any  event  guarantee  results.  I 
was  apparently  too  obtuse  to  see  what  was  wanted. 

After  our  cause  had  been  consistently  championed 
for  a  considerable  time  by  the  daily  newspapers,  the 
Tacoma  Ledger  turned  bitterly  against  us  and  began 
to  attempt  our  undoing  at  a  time  when  we  most  needed 
their  support.  The  fact  that  we  refused  to  submit  to 
a  graft  of  $3,000  levied  by  it  may  have  had  something 
to  do  with  it.  Then  later  the  Tacoma  Daily  News 
followed  suit,  experiencing  its  change  of  heart  over 
night,  and  what  happened  during  that  night  to  change 
its  attitude  can  be  guessed  fairly  correctly.  The  owner 
of  the  News  soon  acquired  the  Ledger,  and  we  were 
daily  bombarded  through  their  news  and  editorial 
columns  by  shots-  which  invariably  came  from  the 
direction  of  the  camp  of  our  enemy.  The  most  artistic 
lies  were  invented  for  news  items  for  the  purpose  of 
discrediting  our  service  and  keeping  us  from  getting 
franchises  and  power  contracts  in  the  City  and  County, 
while  our  opponent  was  given  a  most  saintly  charac- 
ter, that  became  it  as  well  as  would  a  halo  on  the 
head  of  Satan. 

It  was  of  vital  importance  to  the  citizens  that  we 
should  live  in  order  that  the  opposition  to  us  should 
not  override  them  with  its  arrogant  monopoly.  And 
so  a  political  issue  crystalized  out  of  the  situation 


236 


LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 


which  had  a  run  of  about  two  years,  in  which  at  the 
elections  the  people  offered  their  ticket  familiarly 
known  as  the  "Baker  ticket"  against  the  corruption  or 

"SNOQUALMIE  BAKER"  LEADING  THE 
CHARGE      OF   THE    LIGHT    BRIGADE. 


Tacoma  Ledger  cartoon  during  power  fight.     President  C.  H.  Baker  is 
represented  as   riding  his  hobby  horse  "Snoqualmie"   in   the 
interest  of  Seattle  as  opposed  to  Tacoma,  while  Mayor 
Campbell  and  the  other  officials  of  Tacoma 
join  the  procession. 

"ring  ticket"  put  up  by  the  E.  Company.  The  "ring 
ticket"  was  invariably  defeated,  which  event  the  citi- 
zens usually  celebrated  by  hanging  in  effigy  from  a 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  237 

telegraph  pole  in  the  business  center  the  dwarflike 
owner  of  the  Tacoma  papers  whose  warfare  had  been 
so  bitter  upon  us.  I  was  cartooned  daily  by  both 
papers  during  the  campaign  as  a  tyrant  and  a  hypno- 
tist who  had  corrupted  the  esteemed  Mayor  Campbell 
with  whom  I  was  represented  as  conspiring  to  sap 
Tacoma  for  the  benefit  of  Seattle.  This  free  car- 
tooning was  worth  more  to  our  Company  than  any 
paid  advertising  could  possibly  have  been. 

The  opposition  to  our  various  franchises  took  the 
form  of  undue  influence,  and  we  believe  that  con- 
siderable corrupt  money  was  spent  to  defeat  us. 
Tainted  money  is  thought  to  have  found  its  way  from 
the  opposition  even  into  the  ranks  of  our  own  men. 
The  contract  for  the  penstock  at  the  Falls  which  was 
to  conduct  the  water  from  the  river  above  to  the  water 
wheels  below,  was  in  the  hands  of  a  superintendent 
sent  from  the  East  by  the  contractors,  who  apparently 
had  been  corrupted  by  the  enemy.  It  was  necessary 
to  have  this  penstock  completed  and  in  operation  at 
a  given  date  in  order  to  save  our  franchise,  which 
called  for  the  delivery  of  power  at  certain  specified 
dates.  The  joints  of  this  penstock  were  padded  with 
chunks  of  lead  so  that  when  it  was  completed  it  would 
not  have  held  sand,  much  less  water.  This  foreman 
was  removed  and  another  one  promptly  put  in  his 
place,  who  practically  had  to  rebuild  the  work  at  great 
expense  to  his  employers  in  order  to  make  it  water 
tight. 

Stories  were  circulated  locally  and  in  the  East  that 


238         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

our  power  chamber  at  the  Falls  was  submerged  dur- 
ing the  high  water  periods  in  the  river ;  that  the  river 
leaked  through  the  roof  of  the  same  in  great  torrents 
drowning  out  both  men  and  machinery ;  that  the  rocks 
in  the  roof  were  loose  and  were  continually  falling 
upon  the  men  and  machinery  below,  and  that  in  self 
protection  the  men  had  to  wear  firemen's  helmets  to 
save  their  heads,  and  to  go  attired  in  gum  boots  and 
rubber  clothing  to  keep  from  being  drowned,  when  in 
fact  the  place  is  as  dry  and  as  safe  as  a  lady's  sitting 
room.  All  the  stories  that  an  evil  and  desperate 
genius  could  invent,  and  all  the  deviltry  which  could 
be  devised  was  perpetrated  by  the  opposition,  who  it 
was  said,  engaged  men  to  give  all  their  time  to  this 
particular  department  of  their  business.  The  object 
was  to  utterly  destroy  our  property  and  our  prospects, 
and  all  this  had  to  be  defended  against  by  me.  I  alone 
bore  the  brunt  of  it,  and  watched  for  it,  not  knowing 
where  and  when  the  snake  would  strike  next,  while 
Father  at  the  other  end  of  a  2,000  mile  telegraph  line 
was  kept  constantly  in  touch  with  the  situation  by  me. 
The  credit  of  our  company  was  attacked,  and  my 
father's  personal  credit  was  attacked,  and  I  was  por- 
trayed before  the  minds  of  councilmen  and  legislators 
as  a  man  of  the  worst  character  imaginable,  as  an 
ordinary  gambler  and  as  a  person  continually  intoxi- 
cated, as  one  of  great  extravagance,  and  as  a  visionary 
fool  without  ability  bent  upon  breaking  my  father.  It 
is  hardly  necessary  to  comment  upon  these  allegations 
if  this  statement  is  to  be  read  by  any  person  who  has 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  239 

any  knowledge  of  me  whatsoever,  and  is  mindful  of 
the  results  obtained.  In  any  event,  my  father  believed 
in  me  to  the  core,  and  that  to  me  was  sufficient.  He 
believed  in  my  honesty  and  honorable  instincts.  He 
believed  in  my  ability.  He  knew  that  I  could  fight  if  I 
had  to,  and  that  I  was  not  afraid  to  do  so,  if  necessary 
to  defend  our  property.  He  often  declared  that  I  had 
a  talent  for  negotiation,  organization  and  manage- 
ment, and  a  look  at  the  companies  developed  by  me 
would  seem  to  vindicate  his  judgment.  The  substantial 
endorsement  of  me  in  this  work  by  him, — one  of  this 
country's  great  business  men,  is  certainly  more  than 
an  offset  for  the  invidious  wailing  of  our  enemies 
who  had  ulterior  motives  to  actuate  them. 

However,  these  were  the  methods  pursued  and 
carried  out  to  the  extreme  wherever  possible  and  at 
all  times.  People  who  later  bought  bonds  of  our 
Company  were  filled  with  these  stories  in  order  to 
create  distrust  in  their  minds.  People  who  wished  to 
buy  bonds  and  wrote  out  to  Seattle  or  Tacoma  for 
information  upon  the  subject  nearly  always  received 
replies  in  which  the  enterprise  was  knocked  upon  one 
score  or  another.  Whenever  these  replies  could  be 
located  a  prompt  correction  was  always  demanded  and 
received.  Many  came  from  unknown  sources.  At 
one  time  we  put  out  decoys  under  the  plan  of  having 
some  of  our  heavy  financial  friends  in  the  East  write 
to  our  opponents  for  opinions  on  the  plant.  M.  &  N. 
were  written  to  in  such  a  way  and  replied  that  they 
"understood  there  was  such  a  company  as  the  Sno- 


240         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

qualmie  but  they  knew  very  little  about  it."  How- 
ever, prior  to  this  time,  they  had  made  an  elaborate 
thirty-page  contract  with  us  for  five  thousand  H.P. 
for  twenty-five  years,  obligating  themselves  to  pay 
us  $90,000  a  year,  and  yet  "they  knew  nothing  about 
us."  We  were  often  stifled  with  faint  praise,  which 
was  worse  than  open  condemnation.  This  crusade 
caused  an  utter  failure  of  Mason,  Lewis  &  Co.'s  first 
attempt  to  place  our  bonds  in  the  open  market.  It  was 
not  until  by  accident  that  I  found  Mr.  Demming,  a 
capitalist  from  Terre  Haute,  Ind.,  in  a  Seattle  hotel, 
and  hired  a  special  train  and  took  him  out  to  the  Falls 
and  convinced  him  by  what  he  saw  that  we  were  no 
fake,  that  we  were  able  to  make  a  market.  He  took 
$100,000  of  the  bonds,  and  the  balance  quickly  went 
thereafter  on  their  merits  in  the  open  market  at  our 
own  price  and  without  any  stock  sweetening,  much 
to  the  dismay  of  M.  &  N.,  A.,  B.,  C,  and  the  rest  of  the 
coterie.  These  bonds  sold  later  at  103.  Father  wrote 
me  such  letters  as  these  concerning  the  knocking  we 
were  getting  as  it  came  to  him: 

Jan.  llth,  1901.  "Even  your  friend  Mr.  Latimer  stated 
to  a  party  that  you  had  stuck  me  three  or  four  hundred  thou- 
sand dollars  by  extravagance  in  construction.  This  you  must  not 
speak  of  to  Latimer,  as  I  cannot  at  present  tell  you  more  about 

it, and  as  he  has  written  a  fairly  good  letter  about  it,  we 

can  perhaps  afford  to  let  it  pass.  It  seems,  however,  that  we 
have  had  a  bad  reputation  generally.  The  only  explanation 
I  can  make  to  them  is  that  it  is  the  first  plant  of  any  kind  that 
has  been  constructed  west  of  the  Rocky  Mts.,  that  was  built 
as  thoroughly  as  it  should  be  built,  and  that  people  who  are 
familiar  with  cheap  construction  call  this  'extravagance.' ' 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  241 

Sept.  29th,  1902.  "Harris  of  Mason,  Lewis  &  Co.,  says  that 
the  people  who  find  fault  with  our  bonds  will  not  tell  him 
what  it  is  nor  who  it  is  from,  only  that  they  have  'unfavorable 
reports.'  He  says  the  letter  Smith  wrote  to  his  mother  (which 
was  the  only  one  he  saw)  was  very  different  from  the  one  he 
gave  Hardin.  The  Milwaukee  Trust  Company  was  one  of 
the  purchasers,  but  had  bad  reports,  and  sold  their  bonds,  and 
advised  others  to  do  so.  They  (M.  L.  &  Co.)  have  bought 
these,  and  found  other  purchasers  for  them.  He  says  a  repre- 
sentative of  M.  &  N.,  in  Terre  Haute,  who  came  from  Seattle, 
tells  bond  holders  there  the  property  is  no  good.  There  was 
about  $100,000  placed  in  Terre  Haute,  but  the  people  there 
are  not  disturbed  yet.  He  says  N.  W.  Harris  &  Co.,  were 
actually  bearing  our  bonds  all  the  time  they  had  them  for 
sale." 

The  warfare  against  our  enterprise  continued  in 
various  shapes  and  phases  with  unrelenting  vigor  to 
the  time  of  my  father's  untimely  death.  It  partook 
of  all  the  various  colors  and  forms  of  deviltry  which 
the  ingenuity  of  a  mind  fertile  in  such  expedients  could 
conceive.  We  were  pitted  at  all  times  against  the 
corrupt  money  of  the  opposition  together  with  their 
galaxy  of  resourceful  minds. 

The  greatest  and  most  vital  issue  which  we  ever 
had,  and  the  one  which  redounds  more  to  my  own 
credit  than  anything  else,  was  the  killing  of  the  neigh- 
boring creek  power  proposition  (alluded  to  before  in 
this  narrative)  proposed  by  A.  and  C.  for  the  purpose 
of  defeating  our  project.  I  began  an  agitation  against 
this  through  the  Seattle  Daily  Times,  founded  upon 
such  reasonable  logic  and  facts  that  the  City  rose 
in  indignation  against  them.  This  project  had  for 


242         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

its  purpose  not  only  our  destruction,  but  the  corralling 
of  the  city  water  supply  as  well.  By  showing  that  this 
proposed  plant  meant  pollution  of  Seattle's  future 
water  supply,  I  manoeuvred  to  turn  the  wrath  of  the 
whole  city  upon  these  people,  which  became  so  over- 
whelming that  they  very  promptly  laid  down,  and 
their  scattered  assets  were  later  sold  out  to  the  City, 
and  the  entire  water  shed  of  the  neighboring  creek 
to  the  summit  of  the  Cascade  Mountains  was  at  my 
suggestion,  condemned  for  the  purpose  of  the  future 
Seattle  water  supply  as  it  is  now  in  operation  today. 
In  this  connection  I  have  often  been  called  the 
"Father  of  Seattle's  Water  Supply  System," — for  it 
really  had  its  birth  at  my  instigation,  and  in  my  posi- 
tion taken  against  the  A.  and  C.  people  who  were  con- 
spiring to  euchre  the  people  out  of  it,  and  to  ruin  us  at 
the  same  time. 

In  the  beginning,  by  the  grace  of  our  enemies,  our 
enterprise  was  locally  dubbed  "Charley  Baker's  folly," 
and  continued  under  this  misnomer  until  the  wheels 
began  to  turn  and  power  was  actually  delivered.  It 
has  since  more  frequently  been  called  "Charley 
Baker's  Gold  Mine."  Even  my  friends  thought  we 
were  up  against  a  hopeless  task,  and  the  warmest  of 
them  advocated  surrender  to  the  enemy,  even  at  a 
loss.  Even  men  in  our  own  company  held  at  times  the 
same  views,  and  at  times  the  unrelenting  opposition 
to  us  was  so  great  that  Father,  notwithstanding  all 
the  stubbornness  and  bravery  and  strength  of  his 
nature,  was  inclined  to  yield  and  deliver  the  situation 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  243 

to  our  opponents  who  coveted  it,  and  take  what  we 
could  get  out  of  it.  Perhaps  the  greatest  task  I  had 
in  this  whole  enterprise  was  to  keep  Father  from  fal- 
tering at  times  before  our  enterprise  had  progressed 
far  enough  to  prove  itself,  which  would  have  meant 
therefore,  taking  less  money  than  we  had  in  it,  because 
of  the  fact  that  it  was  at  the  time  still  undemonstrated. 
The  one  great  mistake  and  the  only  serious  one 
made  in  the  carrying  out  of  our  enterprise,  and  the 
one  about  which  is  grouped  all  the  vicissitudes  and 
worries  of  every  sort  which  we  had,  was  the  contract 
tying  us  up  with  M.  &  N.  for  5,000  H.P.  for  twenty- 
five  years.  I  must  be  excused  from  this  error  although 
in  this  connection  I  do  not  wish  to  blame  my  father 
either.  He  was  anxious  that  we  should  have  peace 
with  our  opponents,  and  that  our  company  should  be 
able  to  show  a  fixed  income  at  the  beginning  of  its 
operations.  I  desired  the  same  myself,  but  believed 
it  a  wiser  policy  to  sell  our  power  to  the  public  direct 
instead  of  compelling  it  to  pay  a  middleman's  profits. 
The  five  thousand  H.P.  contract  purported  to  mean  a 
revenue  of  $90,000  per  annum,  and  it  seemed  as  if 
this  would  have  great  weight  in  selling  our  bonds 
when  the  time  came  to  do  so.  The  terms  of  this  con- 
tract isolated  us  practically  from  the  power  and  light- 
ing field ;  that  is  to  say,  we  agreed  upon  our  part  to  do 
no  lighting  nor  to  serve  power  in  smaller  amounts 
than  100  H.P.  nor  to  serve  power  to  street  railroad 
companies  at  all.  In  other  words,  we  practically 
agreed  to  deal  with  no  one  except  M.  &  N.,  and  they, 


244         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

therefore,  with  the  ramifications  of  their  system  prac- 
tically absorbed  the  entire  field.  In  other  words,  to 
use  their  own  language  as  they  proclaimed  it  from  the 
Atlantic  to  the  Pacific,  they  "had  us  bottled  up,"  and 
our  very  relations  with  them  did  more  to  create  dis- 
trust in  our  company  from  the  bondbuyer's  stand- 
point than  anything  else.  The  contract  was  known  as 
a  "gentleman's  agreement,"  but  from  the  moment 
it  was  signed  their  conspiracy  against  us  was  resumed 
in  all  its  worst  forms,  including  withholding  large 
sums  due  us  for  power  service.  Not  to  go  into  details 
of  the  history  of  our  relations  with  M.  &  N.  under  this 
contract,  suffice  it  to  say  that  in  about  a  year,  both  the 
Seattle  and  Tacoma  contracts  were  brought  into  court 
and  outlawed  as  being  contrary  to  public  policy 
and  in  restraint  of  trade  and  because  of  their  violation 
of  them,  and  since  our  company  was  emancipated  from 
the  thraldom  which  was  thereby  placed  upon  it,  it 
immediately  began  to  grow  and  thrive  as  an  inde- 
pendent, successful  and  prosperous  concern. 

The  brunt  of  everything  in  the  West  came  upon 
me  personally.  Even  Father  was  not  fully  aware  of 
the  acuteness  of  the  situation  at  all  times,  for  I  saw 
no  advantage  in  having  him  tormented  as  well  as  my- 
self. I  did  not  wish  to  overtax  his  courage,  for  I  knew 
that  the  call  to  surrender  which  frequently  came  from 
the  enemy  would  be  more  apt  to  result  in  the  white 
flag  going  up  in  Chicago  than  in  Seattle.  I  never 
dreamed  for  an  instant  of  lying  down,  for  I  saw  as 
clear  as  crystal  the  clear  sky  ahead  if  we  kept  our 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  245 

wits  and  nerve  together.  The  enemy  regarded  me  as 
a  rock, — hard  to  either  move  or  shatter,  or  rather  as 
a  fool  perhaps,  too  obtuse  to  yield,  not  knowing  when 
I  was  beaten.  It  looked  as  though  there  was  nothing 
to  which  our  adversaries  would  not  stoop  to  do,  except 
such  acts  as  being  difficult  to  screen  would  lead  its 
shining  lights  to  the  penitentiary.  Later  on  our  trans- 
mission wires  were  frequently  cut,  presumably  in 
order  to  discredit  our  service  while  I  was  making 
important  negotiations  for  power.  The  bombard- 
ment in  the  East  was  centered  against  Father  and  it 
was  calculated  to  discourage  him  and  if  possible  ruin 
him.  Probably  no  one  ever  faced  the  blackguarding 
of  the  E.  Company  and  M.  &  N.  with  more  grim  deter- 
mination and  defiance  than  did  he,  and  the  worry  that 
they  gave  him  at  times  when  he  was  not  in  his  best 
health  aroused  my  indignation  to  a  degree  which  I 
have  not  forgotten.  Father  wrote : — 

Mar.  t5h,  1903.  "If  we  are  beaten  on  these  points,  as  I 
am  afraid  we  are,  what  is  there  left  for  us?  The  outlook  is 
so  disheartening  that  it  breaks  me  all  up ;  there  appears  to  be 
no  end  to  our  troubles  whatever  we  try  to  do,  and  I  am 
thoroughly  discouraged." 

Perhaps  one  of  the  greatest  achievements  in  con- 
nection with  this  enterprise  was  the  securing  of  the 
amendments  to  our  Seattle  Franchise,  by  which  the 
strictures  which  had  been  originally  grafted  therein 
by  our  enemies  for  the  purpose  of  making  the  fran- 
chise fatal  were  removed.  When  I  started  upon  this 
task,  it  seemed  as  though  it  could  hardly  be  accom- 
plished (and  Father  thought  so)  having  as  I  did  have, 


246        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

a  corrupt  council  to  work  with,  the  majority  of  which 
were  thieves.  Several  in  this  council  who  had  not 
been  known  to  have  a  dollar,  blossomed  out  into  large 
real  estate  owners  as  soon  as  the  fight  against  us 
was  well  under  way.  However,  I  was  able  to  arouse 
public  sentiment  on  the  question,  and  the  Manufac- 
turers' Association  of  Seattle,  of  which  I  was  made 
vice-president  for  the  purpose,  also  took  a  hand  in  the 
fight.  Later  the  fight  culminated  in  the  calling  of  a 
grand  jury  to  investigate  the  corrupt  practices  in 
Seattle.  Two-thirds  of  their  time  was  taken  up  in 
the  consideration  of  our  franchise  matter,  and  I  my- 
self went  before  the  grand  jury  and  testified  how  the 
city  council  in  two  different  years,  through  their 
agent,  had  come  to  me  for  the  purpose  of  soliciting 
bribes  of  $1,000  and  $15,000  respectively,  promising  to 
grant  me  any  favor  I  would  ask  and  also  promising 
to  betray  those  who  had  been  in  the  habit  of  bribing 
them.  Evidently  there  were  few  honest  men  in  that 
council,  for  "honest  men  stay  bought."  As  a  result 
of  the  sitting  of  the  grand  jury,  the  leading  council 
members  practically  had  the  choice  of  accepting  situ- 
ations in  the  penitentiary  or  passing  the  amendments, 
so  that  naturally  the  amendments  were  carried,  and 
since  then  we  have  enjoyed  liberal  franchises.  It  was 
generally  understood  at  this  time  that  there  was  a 
sliding  scale  of  prices  for  aldermanic  votes,  which  ran 
from  $5.00  per  head  for  small  favors  up  to  several 
thousand  dollars  per  head  for  railway  franchises,  etc. 
I  also  testified  before  the  grand  jury  of  our  experi- 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  247 

ence  in  another  and  smaller  town  where  we  sought  a 
franchise,  where  some  of  the  councilmen  actually  had 
the  open  arrogance  to  offer  their  votes  to  us  for 
$1,000  each,  stating  that  they  could  do  $200  better 
than  that  in  another  direction,  but  would  prefer  mak- 
ing them  to  us  cheaper  for  the  reason  that  we  were 
more  popular  with  the  public.  They  excused  the 
capitalization  of  their  votes  upon  the  theory  that  coun- 
cilmanic  votes  brought  high  prices  in  Seattle,  and  they 
did  not  see  why  they  should  not  take  advantage  of  a 
good  thing  when  it  was  coming  their  way,  as  well  as 
their  brothers  did  in  Seattle.  Had  there  been  an 
honest  prosecuting  attorney  on  hand  in  Seattle  and 
Tacoma,  such  as  a  Folk  or  a  Heney,  our  prisons  would 
have  secured  a  richer  harvest  of  recruits  than  St. 
Louis  gave  or  than  San  Francisco  expects  to  give. 

In  their  desperate  zeal  to  destroy  our  property  the 
M.  &  N.  interests  blindly  followed  in  the  wake  of  Mr. 
A.,  who  led  them  to  their  Waterloo  when  in  an  unlucky 
hour  he  inspired  them  to  undertake  as  a  measure  of 
spite  against  us,  the  development  of  a  water  power  upon 
a  small  stream  flowing  from  Mt.  Rainier  which  they 
heralded  to  the  world  as  the  greatest  achievement 
which  hydro-electric  science  had  yet  attempted.  The 
plan  consisted  of  diverting  a  small  mountain  stream 
at  the  foot  of  a  glacier  on  Mt.  Rainier  and  carrying 
it  through  a  tortuous  wood  flume  following  the 
devious  course  of  a  precipitous  and  uncertain  moun- 
tain canyon,  to  a  point  where  a  small  reservoir  was 
dug  out  of  the  ground  for  temporary  storage  pur- 


248         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

poses,  from  which  the  water  in  turn  was  supplied  to 
the  water  wheels  below.  Much  was  said  about  this 
alleged  engineering  wonder  before  it  was  built,  but 
there  has  been  an  oppressive  silence  on  the  subject 
ever  since.  Of  course  the  coming  of  this  dangerous 
new  enemy  was  flaunted  in  my  father's  face,  and  he, 
therefore,  asked  me  to  report  upon  the  same.  This  I 
did  after  careful  examination,  making  the  statement 
that  the  project  would  be  most  extravagant  in  con- 
struction, in  operation  and  maintenance.  I  predicted 
that  the  flume  would  slide  out  in  sections,  that  trees 
and  rocks  would  fall  upon  it  and  put  it  out  of  com- 
mission, that  the  water  would  freeze  up  in  winter  and 
cease  to  flow  on  account  of  having  its  source  so  near 
the  glaciers,  that  the  glacial  grit  would  cut  out  the 
water  wheels  and  fill  up  the  reservoir,  that  forest  fires 
would  endanger  the  structures,  and  that  the  plant 
would  prove  a  most  extravagant  and  uncertain  play- 
thing. This  report  and  its  predictions,  reads  almost 
exactly  like  the  history  of  the  plant  as  it  has  since 
transpired,  in  addition  to  which  its  construction  cost 
is  almost  twice  the  usual  cost  per  H.  P.  If  this  project 
had  to  stand  upon  its  own  legs  entirely  and  thus 
become  deprived  of  the  frequent  assistance  which  the 
allied  steam  plants  in  Seattle  and  Tacoma  have  to  give 
to  it,  it  would  cease  doing  business  entirely  and  would 
probably  be  dismantled  and  sold  for  junk.  So  much 
for  this  boomerang  which  was  devised  for  no  other 
purpose  than  to  bankrupt  our  Snoqualmie  Company. 
I  am  glad  to  chronicle  here  that  when  great  floods 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  249 

visit  the  Puget  Sound  countries,  when  forest  fires  rage, 
when  drouth  occurs,  when  the  extreme  cold  of  Winter 
freezes  up  many  of  the  rivers  at  their  source,  and 
when,  because  of  these  things  either  some  or  all  of  the 
electric  power  plants  in  the  Puget  Sound  country  go 
out  of  commission,  then  always  and  invariably  Sno- 
qualmie  is  doing  business  with  colors  flying;  and  in 
the  true  spirit  of  a  public  service  corporation  it  lends 
its  surplus  power  during  such  critical  periods  even  to 
its  adversaries,  who  being  always  crippled  as  soon  as 
the  shadows  of  these  disasters  approach  are  thus 
enabled  to  keep  their  service  going,  to  some  extent  at 
least. 

Then  came  another  bright  idea  likewise  out  of  the 
head  of  Mr.  A.,  and  this  was  to  organize  a  company 
on  White  River  for  the  purpose  of  destroying  or  har- 
assing our  White  River  power  project  by  a  well 
devised  plan  of  bulldozing.  This  company  bought  a 
strip  of  land  about  three  miles  long  on  White  River 
below  the  intake  of  our  White  River  Power  Company, 
subsequent  to  our  having  spent  something  like  $100,- 
ooo  upon  its  development.  The  purpose  sought  to 
be  accomplished  by  this  invasion  was  to  place  legal 
strictures  in  the  way  of  our  diverting  the  river  above 
from  their  premises  below,  for  they  proclaimed  that 
they,  too,  were  going  to  build  a  power  plant  on  White 
River  about  one-tenth  the  size  of  ours,  although  using 
the  same  amount  of  water.  We  were,  therefore,  com- 
pelled to  go  into  court  in  an  action  of  condemnation 
and  we  are  still  in  court  contesting  for  the  rights 


250         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

which  these  pirates  have  attacked,  while  in  the  mean- 
time the  Puget  Sound  communities  are  suffering  and 
waiting  anxiously  for  the  power  which  this  great 
storehouse  of  nature  will  eventually  give  them 
through  the  agency  of  our  company.  Had  it  not  been 
for  this  unfortunate  attack  upon  the  public  welfare 
and  upon  our  plan  in  furtherance  of  it,  White  River 
today  would  be  driving  all  the  standard  railroads  west 
of  the  summit  of  the  Cascade  Mountains  from  Port- 
land to  the  British  boundary,  and  the  prosperity  and 
population  of  the  Puget  Sound  country  would  have 
been  considerably  increased  on  account  of  the  impetus 
to  industrial  development  which  this  new  power 
would  have  given  it. 

Of  course,  the  underlying  motive  for  the  warfare 
upon  our  property  was  not  entirely  for  the  purpose 
of  destroying  it  in  the  sense  of  complete  obliteration, 
but  to  destroy  its  usefulness  to  us  so  that  we  would 
have  no  other  resource  left  than  to  sell  out  for  any 
price  which  might  be  offered.  It  was  perhaps  the  most 
notable  case  of  blackmail  ever  put  up  in  the  West. 
One  of  the  features  of  the  campaign  against  us  was 
the  injecting  of  offers  of  purchase  now  and  then, 
which  offers  began  early  in  our  work  at  a  price  that 
would  no  more  than  let  us  out  or  even  less,  and  then  as 
time  went  on  the  price  began  to  be  more  substantial  as 
the  element  of  profit  to  us  was  recognized  and  consid- 
ered in  the  offers.  As  we  began  to  impress  our  oppon- 
ents more  and  more  that  we  were  there  to  stay  and  not 
to  be  bluffed  or  scared  off,  and  that  we  proposed  to 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  251 

defend  our  property  to  the  end,  the  offers  rose  in 
amount  until  we  could  have  retired  with  a  most  hand- 
some profit  for  the  work  which  we  had  thus  far  put 
in  upon  it.  These  offers  of  course,  were  not  made 
directly,  but  through  other  people  from  different 
directions,  and  all  purporting  to  represent  interests 
entirely  unrelated  to  our  opponents.  There  is  no  doubt 
but  what  some  offers  were  really  independent,  but 
they  were  all  declined  upon  the  theory  that  we  had 
planned  out  a  certain  line  of  work,  wide  in  its  scope 
and  possibilities,  and  that  the  proper  time  to  sell  out 
was  not  at  any  way-station,  but  at  the  terminal  after 
we  should  have  reached  it.  These  offers  of  course, 
almost  invariably  came  to  me  as  I  was  thought  to  be 
the  entire  owner  of  the  enterprise,  because  of  my  being 
the  active  projector  of  it  and  I  always  referred  them 
to  Father,  and  he  invariably  coincided  with  my  advice 
in  rejecting  them.  In  other  words,  I  was  a 
stumbling  block,  and  upon  the  narrow  reasoning  that 
I  would  change  my  views  if  it  were  made  to  my  per- 
sonal interest  to  do  so,  and  without  regard  to  Father's 
interest  in  the  premises,  I  was  offered  at  one  time 
$25,000  in  money  for  no  other  consideration  than  giv- 
ing my  consent  to  selling  out;  together  with  a  sub- 
stantial interest  in  the  property  with  the  new  owners, 
and  a  contract  to  manage  it  as  President  of  the  com- 
pany at  $15,000  a  year  salary.  The  nature  of  the 
offer  however  precluded  me  from  considering  it,  and 
I  felt  moreover  that  we  would  do  better  to  wait.  This 
offer  was  $2,000,000  for  our  stock  and  this  would 


252         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

have  been  about  all  profit  to  us.  We  were  looking 
ahead  to  the  time  when  we  could  as  readily  get  $3,- 
000,000  if  we  would  ever  want  to  sell.  This  was  the 
first  and  only  time  in  my  life  that  a  price  was  bid  for 
my  honor. 

The  warfare  against  our  company  did  not  cease 
by  any  means  with  the  completion  of  the  plant  or  the 
financing  of  our  operations.  They  could,  of  course, 
pursue  us  no  further  in  the  thwarting  of  these  accom- 
plishments, but  they  did  follow  us  thereafter  with  the 
most  industrious  persecution  in  order  to  prevent  us 
from  getting  any  business,  with  the  idea  of  making 
our  concern  an  unprofitable  one  and  therefore  easier 
to  buy,  or  else  possibly  driving  it  into  bankruptcy 
and  buying  it  from  a  Receiver.  The  hardest  fight 
that  they  put  up  against  us  was  in  the  matter  of 
securing  the  contract  for  furnishing  power  to  the  city 
of  Tacoma,  which  city  in  turn  furnishes  all  the  electric 
light  consumed  by  its  inhabitants.  I  was  pursued  to 
my  wits  end  in  securing  this  business,  and  did  not 
finally  succeed  until  we  had  been  routed  once  or  twice. 
The  City  Council  was  at  that  time  generally  corrupt, 
but  there  stood  up  for  the  people  of  that  city  an  honest 
Mayor,  the  Honorable  Louis  D.  Campbell,  than  whom 
Tacoma  nor  any  other  city  has  ever  possessed  any 
braver,  more  scrupulous,  conscientious  nor  more 
honest  a  mayor.  I  finally  succeeded  in  securing  this 
business  by  a  little  ruse,  as  a  result  of  which  Mr.  A., 
our  opponent,  fell  into  the  trap  which  I  had  prepared 
for  him. 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS 


253 


The  bids  for  the  city  lighting  as  advertised  for, 
called  for  a  deposit  of  a  certified  check  equal  in  amount 
to  five  per  cent  of  the  total  cost  of  power  to  be 

CHARLES  H.  BAKER'S 

GRAND  HYPNOTIC  EXHIBITION  AT  CITY  HALL 


Tacoma  Ledger  cartoon,  representing  President  C.  H.  Baker's  supposed 

hypnotic  power  over  Mayor  Campbell  and  other  city  officials 

of  Tacoma,  during  the  power  contract  fight.     The 

mayor  occupies  the  center  of  the  stage. 

furnished  for  the  five  year  term  of  the  contract,  based 
upon  an  arbitrary  estimate  furnished  by  the  Com- 
missioner of  Public  Works,  and  at  the  rate  bid.  I 


254         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

therefore  secured  our  certified  check  at  a  bank  in 
which  one  of  A.'s  lieutenants  was  a  director,  knowing 
that  in  this  way  the  information  as  to  the  size  of  our 
check,  and  consequently  our  bid,  would  get  around 
to  A. ;  but  this  is  where  A.'s  unusual  credulity  caused 
him  to  fall  down,  for  I  had  our  check  made  for  a  sum 
indicating  a  larger  bid  than  the  one  we  actually  sub- 
mitted. The  result  was  that  A.  bid  just  under  what 
our  bid  \vould  have  been  as  purported  by  the  check, 
and  just  over  what  our  real  bid  was,  so  we  secured 
that  business  for  the  next  five  years,  by  the  narrow 
margin  of  a  fraction  of  a  cent  per  kilowatt  hour. 
Chagrined  at  this  defeat,  A.  was  then  determined  to 
secure  for  his  company  a  smaller  contract  for  power 
for  driving  some  of  the  city's  pumping  machinery. 
I  put  up  a  very  strong  talk  indicating  our  desperate 
desire  to  get  this  business  also,  and  we  made  our 
talk  in  such  a  way  as  to  proclaim  a  very  low  bid  as 
likely  to  come  from  us,  which  reached  A.  through 
an  apparent  breach  of  confidence  on  the  part  of  some 
of  our  friends  whom  I  had  instructed  to  breach.  In 
this  way  he  put  in  an  absurdly  low  bid  which  meant 
a  considerable  loss  to  his  company,  being  about  one- 
third  of  the  bid  which  we  submitted  without  any  idea 
of  being  successful.  A.'s  company  is  still  lugging 
along  the  business  at  that  unprofitable  figure,  wrhile 
we  are  still  carrying  ours  at  a  good  profit,  and  with 
credit  to  our  Company.  Mayor  Campbell  in  an 
autograph  letter  to  me  written  during  the  first 
year  of  our  service,  said:  "You  are  furnishing 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  255 

Tacoma  with  the  best  pozver  the  city  has  ever  had." 
There  were  other  good  contracts  which  we  secured, 
although  with  much  trouble,  on  account  of  the  oppo- 
sition setting  pole  lines  to  conflict  with  our  own,  as 
strategetical  measures.  They  also  sought  to  raise  a 
hue  and  cry  in  the  city  government  against  our  high 
voltage,  and  in  that  way  to  secure  legislation  against 
our  running  lines  to  connect  with  certain  desirable 
customers.  This,  however,  did  not  work  very  well  as 
it  was  conceded  that  our  high  voltage  was  no  more 
dangerous  than  their  high  voltage,  although  one  was 
produced  by  water  and  the  other  by  steam. 

In  looking  back  over  our  troubled  career,  the  fact 
is  notable  that  we  have  always  been  victorious  in  our 
brushes  with  the  enemy  and  our  Snoqualmie  Company 
still  lives,  while  the  thousands  of  dollars  which  have 
been  spent  to  annihilate  us  has  resulted  more  to  their 
undoing  than  our  own.  It  is  a  comforting  thought 
also  to  reflect  that  we  have  not  spent  one  cent  in  cor- 
ruption. Can  our  opponents  truthfully  say  this  much 
or  this  little  of  themselves — allowing  even  a  margin 
of  $100,000? 

IV. 

Two  weeks  before  Father's  death  a  disastrous  fire 
at  the  Snoqualmie  Falls  works  destroyed  the  entire 
transforming  plant,  and  put  the  plant  entirely  out  of 
business  for  thirty-six  hours,  and  partially  so  for 
three  weeks.  Our  enemy  refused  to  sell  us  any  of  their 
surplus  power  during  this  period,  but  they  circulated 
among  our  customers  instead  and  tried  to  contract  our 


256         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

business  away  from  us  under  long  term  contracts. 
Citizens  of  Tacoma  had  to  burn  candles  and  oil  lamps 
unless  connected  to  gas  mains,  but  they  did  this  glee- 
fully rather  than  desert  us  in  our  extremity.  This 
was  doubtless  an  incendiary  fire,  and  there  has  been 
considerable  ground  to  believe  that  the  fire  was 
inspired  by  the  enemies  who  have  sought  in  one  way 
or  another  to  discredit  and  destroy  our  enterprise 
from  its  inception.  This  incident  weighed  very 
heavily  upon  my  father's  mind,  and  gave  him  distress 
of  mind  in  his  last  days. 

The  shining  lights  in  this  enterprise  have  died  in 
harness.  Among  them  is  numbered  Col.  Lyon,  the 
able  and  efficient  first  Secretary  and  Treasurer ;  Paul 
Hoffman,  an  illustrious  foreman  of  construction  who 
was  electrocuted;  Knight,  a  college  trained  superin- 
tendent, who  lost  both  hands  by  electrical  contact  in 
heroically  attempting  to  save  Hoffman;  a  station 
attendant  who  was  killed,  and  a  lineman  who  was 
killed,  all  of  which  casualties  occurred  after  the  plant 
was  completed  and  without  any  apparent  reason  there- 
for, and  through  the  individual  carelessness  of  the 
victims.  The  writer  escaped  by  a  second  the  fate  of 
Hoffman  and  Knight  in  going  to  their  assistance. 
Then  just  before  the  final  completion  of  our  project, 
on  October  6,  1903,  came  Father's  death  in  the  midst 
of  a  peaceful  sleep  without  any  previous  illness,  and 
then  a  period  of  over  a  year  of  doubt  and  anxiety, 
and  then  I,  the  father  of  the  enterprise,  its  inventor 
and  the  one  who  inch  by  inch,  in  the  face  of  such 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  257 

formidable  opposition  had  brought  it  to  the  zenith  of 
its  financial  and  mechanical  success,  after  I  had  suc- 
cessfully negotiated  with  N.  W.  Harris  &  Company 
for  the  sale  of  our  bonds  for  refunding  our  indebted- 
ness, was  driven  from  it  with  no  reason  ever  having 
been  given,  but  apparently  as  a  result  of  the  oppor- 
tunity given  by  Father's  death  for  the  display  of 
resentment  coming  from  those  who  were  jealous  of 
my  success,  and  for  the  manipulation  of  the  company 
by  speculators  which  our  "financing"  had  let  in  upon 
us.  Father  in  his  lifetime  had  warned  me  against  the 
Harris  firm  as  one  not  to  be  trusted,  but  I  thought  I 
knew  better  and  so  paid  dearly  for  my  disregard  of  his 
advice  and  putting  myself  in  their  power.  Father's 
letters  contain  the  following  references  to  them : — 

Dec.  14,  1897.  "It  is  my  belief  and  has  been  all  the  time, 
that  it  is  a  tricky  hypocritical  outfit, — 

Jan.  13,  1898.  "I  always  have  the  feeling  that  whatever 
they  tell  me  in  that  office  is  a  lie." 

My  going  from  the  company  as  I  did  was  the  signal 
for  a  spontaneous  expression  of  affection  from  every 
one  in  its  employ  which  crystalized  in  the  gift  to  me  of 
a  superb  three-stone  diamond  ring,  accompanied  by  a 
testimonial  of  esteem  engraved  on  a  plate  of  silver, 
containing  as  well  the  names  of  the  forty-five  donors. 

Of  course  these  trials  and  discouragements  drew 
Father  and  myself  into  closer  relation  and  more 
mutual  sympathy  than  would  otherwise  have  been 
the  case.  We  exchanged  letters  almost  daily  for  five 
years,  and  if  there  wasn't  anything  to  write  about 


258         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

we  would  write  just  to  state  the  fact.  He  was  ever 
solicitous  of  me  least  my  health  break  down  under  the 
strain,  as  it  did  two  or  three  times,  and  notably  so 
when  I  had  appendicitis  and  had  to  be  operated  upon. 
In  a  letter  of  October  10,  1899,  he  wrote  to  me:— 

"I  do  not  want  you  to  take  any  risks  for  the  sake  of  the 
work.  Let  that  take  care  of  itself ;  your  health  is  the  first  and 
only  consideration." 

We  not  only  in  our  letters  dwelt  upon  the  progress  of 
the  work  and  of  how  to  keep  the  enemy  from  downing 
us,  but  he  gave  me  all  his  confidences,  on  all  subjects, 
even  the  most  personal  and  private.  He  came  to  me 
alone,  as  he  did  to  no  one  else  in  the  world.  On  April 
6,  1903,  just  six  months  before  his  death  he  wrote:— 

"There  is  actually  no  one  else  in  the  world  I  can  talk  to 
confidentially  since  Mamma  got  too  ill  to  comprehend." 

The  greatest  ambition  I  had  in  connection  with 
the  conception  and  upbuilding  of  this  project  was  as 
already  stated,  to  be  the  means  thereby  of  delivering 
my  father  from  the  uncertainties  of  business  life  upon 
the  Board  of  Trade  in  Chicago.  I  looked  forward  to 
the  time  when  our  work  would  be  finished  and  when 
we  could  each  draw  dividends  so  that  we  might  retire 
to  a  comfortable  and  happy  life,  free  from  daily  wor- 
ries and  perplexities,  and  when  I  at  the  same  time 
would  be  in  a  situation  where  I  would  be  independent 
in  the  matter  of  income,  and  where  I  would  preside 
over  a  business  which  would  be  profitable  and  con- 
genial and  which  I  could  expand  during  my  remaining 
days  as  a  business  compatible  with  my  ability,  taste 
and  experience.  Father  died  six  months  too  soon  to 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  259 

realize  this  dream.  We  were  in  the  midst  of  putting 
our  principal  and  subsidiary  companies  together  and 
financing  their  consolidation  when  this  deplorable 
event  occurred.  The  plant  had  already  proved  a  pro- 
nounced mechanical  success,  the  earnings  had  ex- 
ceeded my  promises,  and  all  that  remained  was  to  com- 
plete the  refunding,  when  he  would  have  his  money  out 
with  interest,  and  our  stock  would  be  clear.  It  was  a 
question  of  only  a  couple  of  months  when  this  would  be 
done  and  we  would  have  income  securities  worth  two 
million  dollars  to  divide  equally  between  us  as  the  net 
profit  from  the  enterprise.  The  refunding  would  have 
been  accomplished  nearly  a  year  previous  and  our  ex- 
pectations then  realized  except  that  the  bedevilling  of 
us  on  White  River  by  our  opponents  compelled  a  radi- 
cal change  in  our  financial  plans  and  the  institution  of 
legal  proceedings  against  them,  which  consumed  much 
time.  However  I  was  glad  to  realize  that  Father  saw 
that  we  had  achieved  success,  and  if  he  could  only  have 
stayed  to  enjoy  it,  I  would  willingly  give  him  my  place 
here  to  do  so. 

Then  came  the  aftermath.  Then  happened  things 
only  made  possible  by  his  death,  and  for  this  reason 
they  must  be  added  to  his  story.  Then  again  came  the 
opportunity  to  our  enemies  to  whom  the  gates  were 
opened  to  come  at  me  alone  upon  whom  my  father's 
mantle  had  fallen,  and  then  followed  a  record  of  per- 
fidy, and  misconduct  which  would  more  than  fill  this 
book  if  all  were  to  be  told.  It  would  be  told  how  our 
ancient  enemy  C.  showed  his  head  again  almost  before 


260        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

my  father's  grave  was  covered,  how  he  came  into  the 
councils  of  the  estate  and  of  the  Company  as 
mischief  maker,  and  in  collusion  with  A.  and 
the  administrators  tried  again  to  surrender  our 
Company  to  the  opposition.  It  would  be  told  how 
I  negotiated  a  contract  with  N.  W.  Harris  &  Com- 
pany to  finance  the  Company,  although  Father 
in  his  lifetime  had  warned  me  against  them  as  unre- 
liable, but  I  thought  differently  until  I  got  wiser  by 
later  experience;  how  they  sent  two  engineer  experts 
and  two  accounting  experts  to  investigate  the  prop- 
erty; how  they  all  reported  of  it  in  highest  terms; 
how  we  then  depended  upon  Harris  &  Company  to 
fulfill  their  contract  and  in  that  faith  went  on  with 
our  construction  operations ;  how  in  the  eleventh  hour 
they  repudiated  their  contract  for  no  reason  given; 
how  as  a  part  of  this  contract  Mr.  Latimer,  of  Seattle, 
Harris'  correspondent  (he  only  would  do  for  this  pur- 
pose) had  secured  an  option  to  buy  a  third  of  the 
Company  for  the  low  price  of  $350,000  for  the  purpose 
of  syndicating  it  locally  and  how  he  in  concert  with 
Harris  threw  down  his  end  of  the  business ;  how  panic 
then  reigned  in  our  affairs  until  we  had  sweat  suf- 
ficiently, and  then  Latimer  re-agreed  upon  the  syndi- 
cate matter  at  $265,000  or  a  saving  to  him  of  $85,000; 
how  to  this  syndicate  all  persons  interested  in  the  Com- 
pany were  invited  to  subscribe,  myself  included,  which 
I  did  to  the  extent  of  $25,000  and  as  the  first  one  to 
do  so;  how  when  the  list  was  full,  I  was  told  that 
there  was  no  stock  left  for  me  as  Harris  would  not 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  261 

consent  to  my  taking  any  as  he  did  not  want  me  in 
the  Company,  although  the  syndicate  idea  was  my  own 
and  one  half  the  syndicate  subscription  I  secured  my- 
self, and  nearly  all  who  went  in  did  so  because  of  my 
connection  with  the  Company;  how  among  other  sub- 
scribers I  secured  the  Westinghouse  Company  for 
$50,000,  which  company  had  always  been  our  staunch 
friend,  and  how  after  they  had  paid  their  subscription 
to  Latimer,  he  allotted  to  them  $66,600  of  preferred 
stock  and  $66,800  of  common  stock,  while  to  Harris 
who  had  also  subscribed  $50,000  he  allotted  $78,500 
of  preferred  stock  and  $141,300  of  common  stock, — 
although  both  were  invited  in  on  the  same  "ground 
floor," — thus  doing  the  Westinghouse  Company  out 
of  $11,900  preferred  and  $74,500  common;  how 
Harris  &  Company  finally  made  a  loan  for  one  year 
to  the  estate  of  $475,000  by  arrangement  with  the 
Administrators,  as  a  substitute  for  the  bond  contract 
which  they  had  repudiated,  with  the  entire  estate  as 
collateral  to  it,  and  a  present  or  bonus  of  one-seventh 
of  the  Company,  or  $525,000  of  the  stock  as  a  "com- 
mission" was  exacted,  although  other  bankers  in  New 
York  and  elsewhere  were  ready  and  willing  to  do  the 
business  without  any  presents,  and  previous  issues 
of  our  bonds  had  been  sold  without  sweetening  and  at 
a  higher  price,  and  at  a  time  before  the  Company  had 
developed  any  earning  power ;  how  shortly  before  the 
year  expired,  Harris  &  Company  finally  bought  the 
bonds  at  the  original  price  agreed  upon,  after  com- 
pelling the  estate  to  cancel  and  lose  to  it  $165,000 


262         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

securities  in  the  Company ;  how  as  a  part  of  the  deal  I 
was  euchred  out  of  the  use  of  my  securities,  and  of 
all  my  honors  and  positions  in  the  Company,  which 
were  President,  Manager,  Director,  and  Chief  Engi- 
neer,— and  that  without  my  knowledge  until  a  sub- 
ordinate in  Seattle  unmasked  the  administrators, 
Harris  &  Latimer  and  told  me  of  it;  how  as 
a  sugar  coated  pill  I  was  at  first  asked  to  give  up 
the  Presidency  only,  in  favor  of  Latimer  who 
desired  the  distinction  and  salary,  and  to  retain 
my  other  responsibilities  and  salary,  and  to  be 
the  Vice-President  because  they  said  I  was  the  only 
one  who  knew  about  the  business  and  therefore  should 
be  kept  at  the  helm ;  how  this  pill  was  next  changed  for 
one  cutting  out  the  Vice-Presidency,  and  then  for 
other  pills  denying  me  all  things  else  successively 
including  salary,  thus  casting  me  out  empty  handed 
to  hunt  for  a  new  prospect,  while  others  were  enabled 
to  enjoy  the  fruits  of  my  success  and  the  company 
became  a  training  school  for  beginners;  how  Harris 
&  Company  compelled  a  five  year  pool  of  the  estate 
stock  including  mine  in  favor  of  themselves  and  Lati- 
mer as  a  rider  to  the  revised  bond  deal;  how  under 
this  pool  the  Company  was  more  numerously  officered 
than  before,  with  favored  friends  and  relatives  at 
fat  salaries,  who  by  their  arrogance  and  incompe- 
tency  immediately  drove  many  of  the  Company's 
largest  customers  away  from  it,  and  who  by  their 
inability  to  comprehend  the  true  scope  of  the  enter- 
prise as  I  had  conceived  it,  have  permitted  the  oppo- 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  263 

sition  to  reach  out  in  every  direction  and  strengthen 
their  position  while  they  have  been  asleep  and  per- 
mitted the  company  to  lose  ground  and  become  fenced 
in  and  thus  depreciated  in  value ;  how  under  this  pool 
the  Company  was  compelled  to  buy  an  ice  factory  and 
a  diminutive  steam  heat  and  light  plant  for  $380,000 
upon  which  Latimer's  bank  had  a  mortgage  of  about 
$100,000  which  but  for  this  bit  of  "frenzied  finance," 
would  have  remained  much  longer  overdue  and  un- 
paid than  it  was ;  how  as  a  feature  of  this  ice  factory 
job  when  it  had  been  fixed  up  to  load  it  on  the  Com- 
pany, Latimer  and  some  of  his  Directors  made  up  a 
little  pool  among  themselves  and  got  an  option  on  the 
property,  "to  save  it  from  being  secured  by  the  oppo- 
sition" which  had  previously  turned  it  down  at  less 
than  half  the  price,  and  then  turned  it  into  the  Com- 
pany at  a  profit  of  many  thousand  dollars  to  them- 
selves, and  voted  my  stock  for  this  nefarious  purpose ; 
how  when  I  raised  my  voice  and  filed  a  written  protest 
against  this  swindle,  Harris  promptly  threatened  to 
repudiate  his  second  bond  contract  and  confiscate  the 
whole  estate  under  the  note  they  held  unless  I  con- 
sented; how  I  have  since  brought  these  gentlemen 
into  court  to  compell  an  accounting  to  the  stockholders, 
which  suit  is  still  pending  and  has  already  prompted 
one  of  the  offenders  to  disgorge  his  share  of  the 
plunder  without  waiting  for  the  trial ;  how  also  as  an 
afterthought  the  estate  was  compelled  to  loan  the 
Company  $100,000  for  working  capital  or  take  the 
consequences  of  refusing  my  being  closed  out;  how 


264        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

over  $42,000  fees  were  charged  against  the  estate 
during  the  first  year  by  C.  and  numerous  other  law- 
yers and  friends  constituting  the  extensive  "Legal 
Cabinet"  of  the  administrators  when  $3,000  would 
have  been  sufficient,  as  their  services  were  simple 
and  involved  no  litigation  and  were  generally  un- 
necessary and  other  fees  are  still  piling  up  uncurbed 
with  no  one  to  oppose  them  except  myself;  how  the 
administrators  are  endeavoring  to  get  something  like 
$35,000  fees  for  "services"  which  the  attorneys  drew 
pay  for,  thus  ranking  the  administrators  with  leading 
bank  and  railroad  presidents,  although  their  principal 
effort  was  trying  to  manage  a  business  which  so  far 
I  have  received  only  $400  for  creating  and  establish- 
ing ;  how  the  new  management,  inheriting  the  profitable 
business  and  ten  thousand  horse  power  increased  plant 
capacity  which  I  had  established,  has  never  until  last 
winter  paid  a  dividend, — not  because  an  ample  sur- 
plus was  not  earned,  but  apparently  because  Latimer 
&  Harris  were  "long"  on  common  stock  which  would 
thus  be  benefited  at  the  expense  of  the  preferred,  and 
for  the  purpose  of  shaking  out  the  outside  stockholders 
and  buying  in  the  shares  which  they  have  been 
patiently  holding  under  the  promise  of  dividends 
which  always  proved  to  be  wil  o'-the-wisps,  and  in 
the  knowledge  that  the  dividends  were  being  much 
more  than  earned;  and  how,  after  being  banished 
from  my  kingdom  and  humiliated  to  the  last  degree, 
it  was  proclaimed  by  those  who  claimed  my  property 
that  "I  did  not  do  it,  that  it  was  Father's  idea  and 


POWER  DEVELOPMENTS  265 

that  he  hired  me  to  carry  it  out,  that  he  hired  me 
because  I  could  be  had  cheap,  and  in  fact  would  work 
for  nothing,"  that  the  "fame"  I  had  achieved  by  my 
success  was  ample  return  for  me,  that  my  personal 
endorsement  of  the  company's  notes  for  thousands  of 
dollars  meant  nothing,  that  the  $15,000  I  had  invested 
in  the  project  gave  me  no  interest  in  it,  as  that  was 
one  of  the  attributes  of  a  free  job,  and  that  the  only 
interest  I  could  expect  in  this  property  which  I  had 
created  and  which  had  paid  back  all  the  money  Father 
had  in  it,  would  be  my  share  as  one  of  the  numerous 
heirs  of  my  father,  for  no  one  as  yet  has  contended 
that  I  am  not  his  son  and  heir,  although  serious  con- 
sideration was  given  to  the  idea  of  challenging  my 
right  to  even  inherit,  because  of  the  alleged  miscon- 
duct on  my  part  in  having  created  this  property  and 
then  claiming  my  half  of  it,  instead  of  giving  it  grace- 
fully to  others  who  had  contributed  nothing  to  it, 
knew  nothing  about  it,  and  in  some  cases  had  not  even 
seen  it.  These  things  happened  because  I  claimed 
what  was  mine  already. 

But  there  is  a  limit  and  an  end  to  all  things  and 
Justice  is  not  for  all  time  blind.  Our  work  is  done, 
at  least  as  far  as  we  can  do  it  together.  It  was  well 
done.  It  has  not  been  anywhere  excelled.  It  speaks 
for  itself  in  mockery  of  our  defamers,  while  they  have 
been  silenced  and  our  enemies  have  been  routed.  His- 
tory cannot  be  unmade  by  any  manner  of  perversion 
or  crushing  to  earth  of  truth,  although  the  dead  can- 
not come  back  to  proclaim  the  truth  as  the  avenger  of 


266         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

the  wrong.  Snoqualmie  still  stands  an  accomplished 
fact,  and  perhaps  in  more  or  less  changed  form  as 
future  science  may  suggest,  it  will  still  stand  for  cen- 
turies; and  for  centuries  to  come  it  will  still  have  the 
same  duty  to  perform,  and  perform  it  equally  faith- 
fully. The  same  rock  chamber  will  be  there— 
although  larger,  and  will  contain  generation  after 
generation  of  new  water  wheels  and  generators,  each 
better  and  more  extensive  than  their  predecessors, 
with  the  same  never  ceasing  din  of  industry  still  con- 
verting the  waste  energy  of  Nature  to  the  uses  of 
mankind ;  and  White  River  likewise,  in  the  companion- 
ship of  Snoqualmie,  will  serve  the  same  ends  equally 
well  for  probably  all  time  to  come.  This  is  a  project 
that  would  before  this  have  been  annihilated  by  the 
manipulation  and  jobbing  it  has  run  the  gauntlet  of 
since  my  father  and  I  went  out  of  it,  had  it  not  been 
for  its  unusual  merit  and  the  ingredient  honesty  which 
we  incorporated  in  it.  It  is  a  situation  from  which 
history  will  not  divorce  us.  Even  as  I  close  this 
chapter  a  letter  has  come  from  a  gentleman  in  Seattle 
who  voices  that  community  as  he  writes : 

"I  am  pleased  to  know  that  your  prospects  in  your  new 
enterprises  are  good,  but  I  would  much  rather  see  you  make 
your  fortune  out  of  Snoqualmie  and  White  River.  Time  has 
proven  this  much,  that  whenever  Snoqualmie  Falls  is  men- 
tioned, your  name  is  found  linked  with  it  and  mentioned  in 
the  same  breath.  Business  men  here  who  honestly  differed 
with  you  now  acknowledge  that  you  paved  the  way  towards 
furnishing  the  power  that  has  built  up  the  factories  of  this 
and  other  nearby  cities." 


T 


CHAPTER  IX 

ART  INSTITUTE  OF  CHICAGO 
1878-1903 

HE  different  sides  of  Father's  nature  found 
natural  expression  in  the  different  things  with 
which  he  chose  to  be  identified.  The  Board  of 
Trade  reflected  his  commercial  instinct.  The  Civic 
Federation  and  the  World's  Fair  reflected  his  courage, 
his  great  business  and  executive  ability,  and  his  fight- 
ing qualities.  The  Art  Institute  reflected  a  different 
temperament,  of  gentler  and  loftier  attributes  with 
which  he  was  endowed. 

This  Art  Institute  stands  today  among  the  three 
or  four  great  museums  of  the  country.  It  is  remark- 
able that  it  had  its  first  beginning  as  early  as  1866  and 
earlier  than  any  other  similar  institution  anywhere 
else  in  the  country  except  New  York  and  Philadelphia. 
The  nucleus  of  the  present  organization  was  known 
as  the  Chicago  Academy  of  Design,  which  was  merely 
an  association  of  artists  which  continued  in  more  or 
less  active  form  until  1882.  It  did  not  amount  to 
much,  but  such  as  it  was  it  was  the  only  art  centre 
of  importance  in  the  city. 

In  1878  it  was  attempted  to  improve  the  condition 
of  the  organization  by  introducing  a  board  of  trus- 
tees composed  of  business  men,  but  this  met  with  many 


268         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

difficulties  and  resulted  in  the  formation  of  a  new 
organization  which  was  called  The  Chicago  Academy 
of  Fine  Arts.  My  father's  connection  with  this  school 
of  art  began  May,  1878.  It  then  had  rooms  in  Pike's 
Building  at  the  southwest  corner  of  State  and  Monroe 
Streets.  The  school  roll  at  the  time  had  less  than 
twenty  pupils,  and  as  income  was  almost  entirely  lack- 
ing, the  rent  had  to  be  paid  by  certain  gentlemen  who 
had  guaranteed  it,  and  who  rather  unwillingly  had 
to  make  good.their  guarantees.  When  it  was  decided 
to  introduce  a  board  of  trustees  of  business  men,  my 
father  was  chosen  one  of  the  board,  which  position  he 
accepted,  and  thereafter  became  one  of  the  most 
active  and  useful  members.  Among  the  trustees  in 
addition  to  himself  were  D.  W.  Irwin,  N.  K.  Fair- 
bank,  J.  H.  Dole,  Murray  Nelson,  and  Charles  L. 
Hutchinson,  and  it  is  a  notable  fact  that  the  Board  of 
Trade  was  the  chief  strength  of  this  society  at  that 
time,  with  hardly  any  representation  among  profes- 
sional men. 

The  newly  organized  Academy  selected  Mr.  Dole 
for  President  and  my  father  for  Vice-President. 
They  personally  contributed  money  to  put  the  rooms 
in  order,  and  the  school  took  on  renewed  life, 
and  gave  exhibitions  occasionally  during  the  year. 
The  total  number  of  pupils  for  the  year  was  about 
300.  Then  it  was  found  that  the  Academy  was  encum- 
bered by  debts  that  were  unknown  to  the  trustees, 
and  this  resulted  in  unfriendly  feeling  between  them 
and  the  artists.  As  a  result  of  this  my  father  and 


ART  INSTITUTE  OF  CHICAGO  269 

others  of  the  trustees  who  were  acting  solely  for  the 
public  good  and  out  of  no  particular  liking  for  the  old 
Academy  of  Design,  grew  weary  of  the  contentions 
and  resigned  in  a  body  in  the  spring  of  1879.  Father's 
argument  was  that  "there  was  no  need  of  paying  for 
dead  horses."  Then  through  him  and  Mr.  Murray 
Nelson  began  the  movement  for  the  new  institution. 
The  property  of  the  old  Academy  of  Design  was  taken 
by  its  creditors,  but  was  later  on  redeemed  by  the 
Art  Institute  which  was  organized  later.  My  father 
and  a  few  of  his  associates  issued  a  call  for  a  meeting 
at  the  Palmer  House  for  the  purpose  of  organizing 
the  new  Art  Institute.  As  a  result  of  this  and  the 
many  meetings  which  followed  in  which  he  was  most 
active,  the  Art  Institute  of  Chicago  was  organized  and 
a  charter  procured  therefor  on  March  24,  1879  and 
and  in  this  organization  Father  became  one  of  the 
original  trustees  and  so  continued  until  his  death. 

During  the  whole  period  of  more  than  twenty-five 
years  he  was  a  member  of  the  executive  committee  and 
took  an  active  part  in  every  important  movement  of 
the  institution.  Although  a  very  active  worker  for 
this  organization,  of  which  he  early  became  very  fond, 
he  nevertheless  did  not  allow  his  name  to  appear  to 
any  extent.  Mr.  George  Armour  was  the  first  Presi- 
dent of  the  Art  Institute  and  Mr.  L.  Z.  Leiter  the 
second.  Great  progress,  however  was  not  effected 
until  the  election  of  Mr.  Hutchinson  to  the  Presi- 
dency in  1882,  although  the  school  was  maintained 
creditably  and  some  exhibitions  were  held.  During 


270         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

these  years  my  father  contributed  a  great  deal  of 
money  and  time  to  the  institution,  and  was  a  faithful 
friend  to  it  at  all  times  when  it  had  need  of  friends. 
He  was  consistent  and  firm  in  his  attitude  at  the 
meetings,  as  he  was  at  the  meetings  of  the  other 
organizations  to  which  he  belonged,  and  as  usual  he 
continually  rebuked  those  who  came  late  and  caused 
him  to  lose  time  in  consequence.  For  many  years  he 
was  the  auditor  of  the  Art  Institute. 

From  the  early  beginning  in  rented  quarters,  the 
Institute  in  1885  acquired  and  moved  to  the  corner 
of  Michigan  Avenue  and  Van  Buren  Street  and  built 
thereon  a  handsome  brownstone  building,  which  it 
occupied  for  a  number  of  years,  and  afterwards  sold 
it  to  the  Chicago  Club  at  a  considerable  profit  for 
$425,000.  It  soon  outgrew  these  quarters,  however, 
which  at  first  were  thought  to  be  more  than  ample, 
as  the  result  of  which  an  arrangement  was  effected 
with  the  World's  Columbian  Exposition  to  contribute 
$200,000  towards  the  erection  of  a  palatial  building 
upon  the  lake  front  at  the  foot  of  Adams  Street,  the 
use  of  which  the  exposition  had  during  the  Fair.  To 
this  contribution  was  added  the  proceeds  from  the 
sale  of  its  former  quarters,  which  completed  the  pay- 
ment for  the  new  building  that  the  Institute  is  now 
occupying.  This  building  has  been  added  to  from 
time  to  time  through  different  endowments,  and  at 
the  same  time  the  institution  has  grown  into  having 
national  fame  and  importance,  and  is  probably  the 
largest  fine  art  school  in  the  United  States.  As  a 


ART  INSTITUTE  OF  CHICAGO  271 

result  of  its  progressiveness  and  establishing  itself 
in  such  well  designed  and  permanent  quarters,  it  has 
become  the  recipient  of  many  valuable  bequests  of 
pictures,  statuary  and  other  works,  all  representing 
the  fine  arts. 

The  annual  report  of  the  Institute  for  1904  con- 
tains this  paragraph  in  reference  to  my  father: — 

"The  Art  Institute  has  been  fortunate  in  having  closely 
connected  with  its  management,  a  man  who  in  many  respects 
represented  the  best  type  of  Chicago  citizenship,  public  spirited 
without  ostentation,  of  fearless  integrity,  sagacious  in  business, 
and  simple  and  unaffected  in  private  intercourse." 

As  a  testimonial  to  my  father's  love  of  art  and  his 
devotion  to  this  institution,  we,  his  children,  have 
given  to  the  Art  Institute  one  of  Van  Dyck's  best 
paintings  entitled  "Portrait  of  Helena,  wife  of  Hen- 
drick  Du  Bois,"  a  painting  that  is  about  300  years 
old.  It  was  little  enough  to  do  for  him,  for  undoubt- 
edly had  he  lived,  he  would  have  done  manyfold  more 
for  the  Institute  in  a  material  way  than  our  slight  tri- 
bute amounted  to.  I  am  proud  of  the  fact  that  my 
father  constituted  one  of  the  small  group  of  men  who 
did  the  real  work  of  forming  and  carrying  on  the 
great  Art  Institute. 


GLIMPSES  OF  MY  FATHER  IN  THE  SUMMER  TIME  AT  Ex  MOOR, 

HIGHLAND    PARK,    ILLS. 


CHAPTER  X. 
HOME  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER. 

"Formed  on  the  good  old  plan, 
A  true  and  brave  and  downright  honest  man ; 
He  blew  no  trumpet  in  the  market  place, 
Nor  in  the  church  with  hypocritical  face 
Supplied  with  cant  the  lack  of  Christian  grace; 
Loathing  pretence,  he  did  with  cheerful  will 
What  others  talked  of,  while  their  hands  were  still." 

— Whittier. 

A  STRANGER  to  my  father  who  might  read  the 
preceding  narrative  would  be  able  to  write  this 
chapter  and  give  a  correct  analysis  of  his 
character,  but  few  strangers  ever  saw  him  as  we 
knew  him  in  his  home.  Never  has  fiction  nor  poetry 
conjured  up  and  painted  a  sublimer  picture  than 
Father's  tender  love  and  solicitude  for  his  invalid 
wife, — my  step-mother,  as  it  was  enacted  in  his  daily 
life  at  home  during  his  last  years.  From  a  most  beau- 
tiful and  gifted  woman,  such  as  she  was  when  he 
took  her  for  his  wife,  she  became  transformed  through 
a  period  of  years  by  the  curse  of  her  affliction,  until 
she  was  but  a  living  body  from  which  the  mind  had 
fled,  and  which  had  moulded  itself  into  but  a  mockery 
of  what  her  former  self  had  been.  She  was  dead  to 
herself  and  to  most  of  the  world,  but  not  so  to  him, — 
she  was  his  sweetheart  still.  The  last  ten  years  of  her 


274         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

life  found  her  in  this  dreadful  plight.  He  was  dur- 
ing this  period  more  gallant,  thoughtful,  and  atten- 
tive to  her  than  the  young  lover  of  twenty-one  would 
be  to  his  fiance.  From  downtown  he  would  telephone 
the  house  once  or  twice  each  day  to  "see  how  mamma 
is."  He  gave  up  the  pleasures  that  men  usually 
have  in  order  to  be  at  her  side.  He  never  took  a 
needed  outing  nor  a  hunting  trip  such  as  he  used  to 
be  so  fond  of,  because  it  meant  a  night  or  more  away 
from  her.  If  the  extreme  necessities  of  business  com- 
pelled him  to  be  away,  as  happened  only  infrequently, 
he  telegraphed  from  his  heart  to  her,  morning,  noon 
and  night,  and  if  the  replies  edited  by  his  daughter 
did  not  come  exactly  at  the  hour  and  minute  he  had 
calculated  for  their  reception,  he  would  begin  to  stew 
and  fret  and  chafe  until  he  became  quite  beside  him- 
self with  misgivings  and  worry.  And  then  when  the 
telegram  would  finally  come,  he  would  read  it  and 
re-read  it  and  be  himself  again,  unless  he  would  won- 
der if  between  the  lines  it  forbode  more  than  its  face 
implied,  and  then  he  would  stew  and  fret  again.  He 
believed  himself  to  be  entirely  indispensable  to  her,  for 
he  thought  no  one  understood  her  as  he  did,  and  no 
one  could  do  for  her  as  he  could,  notwithstanding  that 
she  had  the  best  of  care  and  attention  night  and  day 
from  my  sister  Bertha  and  from  regularly  retained 
trained  nurses.  He  worried  his  strength  and  nerves 
away  without  its  helping  her.  He  wrote  me  three 
years  before  he  died, — "Mamma  is  growing  weaker 
day  by  day,  and  I  hardly  think  we  will  have  her  with 


HOME  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  275 

us  Christmas."  And  yet  she  lived  six  years  after 
that,  and  three  years  after  he  was  gone,  during  which 
time  she  did  not  know  that  he  was  dead  nor  did  she 
miss  him.  Was  there  anything  more  beautifully  piti- 
ful? In  the  almost  daily  letters  I  had  from  Father 
during  the  last  several  years  of  his  life  he  never  failed 
.to  close  without  a  thoughtful  reference  to  her,  to  the 
effect  that  "Mamma  is  some  better  today,"  "Mamma 
seems  more  cheerful  than  yesterday,"  or  "Mamma  had 
a  sinking  spell  this  morning  which  has  made  me  very 
blue  all  day." 

Although  with  him  the  sun  rose  and  set  upon  the 
shrine  where  he  worshipped, — his  wife,  yet  he  was 
a  father  too,  and  this  fact  he  did  not  overlook  nor  did 
we  fail  to  appreciate  it.  But  he  was  nevertheless  a 
puzzle  to  his  children.  He  was  demonstrative  towards 
his  wife  in  his  affection  for  her,  but  not  so  towards 
them,  not  even  to  his  daughter.  But  we  could  read  the 
very  soul  of  him  and  see  that  love  was  there  in  full 
measure.  He  never  told  it  by  word  of  mouth,  never 
in  his  life,  but  he  showed  it  in  look,  in  actions,  and 
particularly  in  what  he  said  to  other  people.  It  was 
a  noticeable  peculiarity  of  his  that  he  seldom  com- 
mended anyone  either  in  or  out  of  the  family  to  their 
face,  but  to  others  he  would  speak  of  them  in  proud 
terms  of  unstinted  praise  and  affection.  This  I  could 
never  understand,  for  a  well  deserved  compliment 
from  him  now  and  then  would  have  added  an  inch 
to  the  growth  of  any  of  us.  As  children  we  seldom 
confided  our  troubles  and  secrets  to  him  and  he 


276         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

did  not  seem  to  care  for  our  confidences,  but  this  all 
changed  when  we  grew  up  and  grew  older  and  found 
in  him  our  best  friend  and  chum.  There  was  in  him 
a  kind  of  selfishness,  or  better  perhaps  should  it  be 
called  thoughtlessness.  I  do  not  think  for  instance 
that  it  ever  occurred  to  him  that  his  young  daughter 
did  not  have  the  same  freedom  and  enjoyment  that 
other  girls  did,  and  that  she  was  giving  up  all  this  for 
his  sick  wife, — which  was  for  him.  Towards  the  end 
however,  he  softened  up  and  fully  realized  what  his 
daughter  had  been  to  him,  and  then  he  began  to  show 
his  appreciation  of  it.  As  he  grew  older  he  became 
a  most  charming  companion  for  anyone,  man,  woman 
or  child.  He  liked  to  talk,  small  talk  and  big  talk, 
reminisce  and  argue  in  a  most  agreeable  fashion,  and 
tell  stories.  And  yet  it  can  be  remembered  in  his 
early  prime  how  quick  tempered  he  was,  how  like  a 
tempest  he  was  if  things  went  wrong  or  displeased  him, 
and  how  unforgiving  he  was  with  stupidity.  He  could 
not  understand  why  anyone  could  be  born  stupid  or 
grow  that  way  afterwards,  and  to  him  it  was  quite 
unpardonable.  But  in  that  period  of  his  life  he  was 
engaged  in  a  strenuous  business  of  great  excitement 
and  uncertainties,  so  it  is  not  to  be  wondered  at  if  his 
nerves  got  on  edge  and  his  disposition  spoiled  a  little, 
making  him  at  times  disagreeable  and  hard  to  get 
along  with.  It  seemed  as  if  his  whole  mind  and  ner- 
vous system  were  reflected  in  his  face,  in  which  happi- 
ness, worry,  unrest,  contempt,  discouragement  or 
determination  were  all  in  turn  depicted  according  to 


HOME  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  277 

his  mood.  His  face  was  an  accurate  thermometer 
of  the  wheat  market,  and  his  family  grew  to  under- 
stand him  so  well  that  when  he  came  home  at  night, 
they  could  almost  tell  the  price  of  wheat  within  half 
a  cent  by  a  glance  at  his  face. 

His  life  spelled  out  honor  and  truth.  He  was  so 
inherently  honest  and  true  by  the  grace  of  God  that  he 
could  not  even  think  dishonestly,  much  less  be  so. 
Upon  this  trait  my  pen  most  surely  cannot  over  reach 
itself  for  he  was  the  exemplar  of  these  virtues.  There 
was  not  the  slightest  taint  of  anything  to  the  con- 
trary in  his  nature  from  his  boyhood  to  his  grave. 
I  remember  when  I  was  in  College  and  was  manager 
of  the  Alpha  Delta  Phi  chapter  house  there  where 
about  twenty  of  the  boys  lived  together.  I  was  cus- 
todian of  the  funds.  It  happened  that  our  remittance 
from  home  one  month  had  not  arrived  with  the  cus- 
tomary promptness,  so  that  our  board  and  tuition  were 
overdue.  I  therefore  wrote  Father  a  jacking  up  letter 
telling  him  that  because  of  his  being  so  slow  I  had  bor- 
rowed from  the  chapter  funds  to  pay  our  bills,  and  so 
he  had  better  hurry  and  remit  so  that  I  could  pay 
back.  And  he  did  hurry,  and  with  the  remittance 
came  such  a  letter !  It  was  not  only  like  a  ton  of 
bricks,  but  a  fatherly  letter  as  well,  telling  how  such 
innocent  borrowing  of  trust  funds  was  almost  always 
the  underlying  cause  of  great  defalcations  and  crimes 
committed  without  original  criminal  intent.  I  saw  it 
as  I  had  not  seen  before,  and  I  saw  it  so  well  that 
thereafter  I  would  not  let  my  postage  stamps  or  my 


278         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

personal  pennies  get  physically  mixed  with  those  of 
the  chapter  house. 

And  again,  I  recall  when  we  were  in  the  midst  of 
our  franchise  fights  in  Seattle,  when  we  were  in  the 
position  of  having  spent  already  over  $100,000  as  a 
display  of  our  good  faith  in  building  the  works, — how 
at  this  point  we  were  threatened  with  the  prospect  of 
not  being  able  to  get  any  franchises  at  all, — which 
would  have  made  valueless  our  investment, — how  then 
the  road  to  glory  was  pointed  out  to  me  and  would 
be  open  to  me  if  I  would  but  bribe  certain  of  the  coun- 
cilmen  as  related  in  a  previous  chapter,  and  how  when 
asked  for  my  reply  to  the  proposal  to  that  end  I  told 
their  agent  to  say  for  me, — "Tell  the  gentlemen  to  go 
to  hell."  This  occurrence  I  reported  to  Father  and 
asked  his  views  upon  it.  He  answered,  "You  did 
right;  I  would  rather  see  you  demolish  the  plant  and 
throw  it  into  the  river  and  count  it  entirely  lost  to  us 
than  to  do  a  thing  so  dishonorable."  And  then  he 
added  a  story  of  his  own  experience  with  an  invest- 
ment in  St.  Louis  street  car  stock.  He  told  how  in 
accordance  with  his  usual  care  he  scrutinized  the 
reports  of  the  street  railway  company  there,  how  he 
saw  where  large  sums  had  been  paid  out  for  "attor- 
neys' fees"  when  there  had  been  no  litigation  nor  legal 
services  rendered,  how  contemporaneously  with  these 
unprecedently  large  and  mysterious  disbursements 
the  Company  had  received  extraordinary  municipal 
favors,  how  they  could  give  him  no  satisfactory  expla- 
nation in  answer  to  his  demand,  and  how  in  his  arith- 


HOME  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  279 

metic  two  and  two  made  four,  and  it  smelled  bad 
to  him.  So  he  then  gave  notice  to  his  associates  that 
he  believed  there  was  fraud  somewhere,  that  he  did 
not  feel  at  home  in  their  company  in  consequence,  and 
that  he  would  sell  out  and  get  out.  And  this  he  did, 
and  was  thus  the  first  to  scent  the  great  scandal  which 
later  on  sent  a  number  of  "respectable"  citizens  of  St. 
Louis  to  the  penitentiary  at  the  time  when  Mr.  Folk 
was  prosecuting  Attorney. 

In  the  ups  and  downs  of  business,  my  father  was  a 
wealthy  man  in  fluctuating  degrees.  He  had  no  ambi- 
tion to  be  a  modern  Croesus  or  the  product  of  latter 
day  "frenzied  finance,"  but  only  to  have  enough  to 
insure  the  comforts  and  pleasures  of  life  compatible 
with  his  tastes  and  position,  and  to  enable  him  to  do 
something  for  those  who  were  to  follow  him,  and  also 
for  his  fellow  men,  to  whom  he  felt  that  everyone  owed 
an  individual  duty  measured  according  to  his 
ability.  He  often  said  to  me  when  we  would 
discuss  the  fabulous  tainted  fortunes  of  the  pres- 
ent day,  "I  would  rather  keep  a  good  name  to  leave  to 
you  children  than  to  pile  up  a  big  fortune  by  ques- 
tionable methods."  He  felt  that  when  a  man  had  more 
than  enough  it  was  bad  for  him  and  injurious  to 
society,  and  he  felt  that  the  real  sturdy  manhood  of 
each  generation  was  best  developed  by  making  its 
own  way  rather  than  by  being  lifted  and  coddled  along 
by  heritages  from  the  one  preceding. 

Father  was  not  cut  out  for  a  politician.  He  could 
not  trim  himself  to  suit  the  varying  winds.  He  could 


280         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

not  go  astraddle  of  any  issue;  he  was  either  on  one 
side  or  the  other,  and  with  all  the  positiveness  of  clear 
conviction  and  sustaining  courage.  His  percep- 
tive faculties  were  clear  and  sound,  and  with  an 
honest  nature  behind  him  his  views  were  radical  and 
advanced.  He  was  tenacious  and  combative  in  argu- 
ment. He  believed  in  fair  play  and  the  rule  of  the 
majority,  accepting  defeat  gracefully  when  it  came  to 
him.  He  was  reasonable  and  open  to  conviction,  but 
unless  convinced,  the  whole  world  might  hold  to  one 
opinion,  and  it  would  not  alter  his,  although  willing 
to  accept  the  law  "if  all  the  world  is  wrong,  then  alt 
the  world  is  right."  He  used  to  be  impolitic  and  un- 
suave  in  a  way  that  worked  to  his  disadvantage.  He 
was  curt  to  reporters  and  frequently  turned  them  away 
abusively  so  that  he  was  often  depicted  in  the  public 
press  not  as  fairly  as  he  should  have  been,  and  he  was 
not  "written  up"  in  the  frequent  and  complimentary 
style  that  those  who  courted  reporters  were  wont  to 
be  favored.  If  he  despised  a  man  or  his  methods  he 
would  publicly  snub  him  without  hesitation.  I  have 
seen  him  politely  greeted  by  one  of  our  adversaries 
in  the  power  fight,  upon  whom  he  turned  his  back  so 
completely  and  abruptly  as  though  he  never  existed. 
The  bluntness  which  often  characterizes  an  honest 
man  is  well  illustrated  in  his  case  by  an  incident  occur- 
ring at  the  official  celebration  of  the  track-raising  of 
the  Illinois  Central  Railroad.  A  party  of  prominent 
citizens,  including  the  Mayor,  members  of  the  city 
council,  certain  business  men  and  world's  fair  direc- 


HOME  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  281 

tors  went  out  on  the  railroad  to  the  scene  of  the  for- 
malities. As  President  of  the  World's  Fair,  Father 
was  called  upon  for  a  speech,  in  the  course  of  which 
he  referred  to  the  final  success  of  the  track-raising 
movement  of  which  he  had  been  such  a  constant  advo- 
cate, and  remarked  in  this  connection  that  "the 
improvement  would  have  been  brought  about  years 
before  had  it  not  been  for  the  corruption  in  the  city 
council."  At  the  close  of  the  exercises  the  Mayor 
spoke  to  him  and  protested  against  his  allusions,  which 
he  stated  had  hurt  the  feelings  of  the  honorable  mem- 
bers of  the  city  council;  to  which  Father  made  the 
curt  reply,  "No  one  was  hurt  who  was  not  hit." 

If  he  did  not  like  a  man  or  disapproved  of  his 
methods  he  had  no  use  for  him,  and  that  man  could 
read  it  in  his  face  and  manner  as  well  as  hear  it  from 
his  lips.  Then  too  he  lacked  at  times  discretion  in 
dealing  with  men  in  business  matters.  As  illustrating 
this,  it  may  be  mentioned  how  as  bank  director  he  dis- 
covered one  day  that  the  collateral  of  a  certain  large 
borrower  in  apparently  good  standing  was  spurious; 
how  he  insisted  that  the  note  be  at  once  called  although 
only  within  about  ten  days  of  maturity;  how  the  Presi- 
dent of  the  bank  stood  off  his  persistency  until  the 
note  was  due,  not  sleeping  nights  the  while,  and  then 
at  maturity  politely  declined  to  renew  for  the  reason 
that  other  customers  needed  and  were  entitled  to  the 
accommodation,  and  suggesting  that  the  loan  be  made 
elsewhere;  and  how  the  debtor  actually  did  borrow 
from  another  bank  in  order  to  pay  the  first  one, — but 


282        LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

the  other  bank  was  never  paid  its  money  again.  Then 
too  there  was  a  measure  of  carelessness  about  Father 
and  the  taking  of  long  chances  which  displayed  a  lack 
of  conservatism  and  a  disregard  for  the  uncontrollable 
future.  No  better  evidence  of  this  can  be  found  than 
the  fact  that  he  left  no  will.  Why  this  precaution  was 
overlooked  and  one-third  of  the  inheritance  to  his  chil- 
dren placed  in  jeopardy  of  filtering  out  to  a  horde  of 
unknown  and  impecunious  relatives  of  our  step- 
mother,— his  heir,  can  only  be  conjectured,  but 
it  may  perhaps  be  charged  to  the  natural  optimism 
which  characterized  his  life,  for  he  was  well  and  vig- 
orous and  had  no  thought  of  dying,  and  probably  in- 
tended to  distribute  his  estate  during  his  lifetime.  He 
was  indeed  an  optimist  and  believed  in  the  world 
growing  better,  with  the  millenium  ahead  and  rapidly 
getting  nearer  all  the  time.  It  is  that  quality  in  a 
life  which  helps  to  move  the  world  onward,  acting 
as  an  antidote  to  the  ultra  cautious  and  narrow  man 
who  will  ever  hold  it  back.  His  optimism  attached 
even  to  wheat  on  which  he  was  always  a  "bull,"  for  he 
believed  that  high  prices  meant  more  money  to  the 
farmers  and  therefore  more  prosperity  for  the  whole 
country,  and  so  he  believed  in  high  prices. 

He  was  a  scholar  both  by  nature  and  by  his  own 
making.  Although  all  his  schooling  could  be  boiled 
down  into  one  solid  year,  yet  he  learned  afterwards 
from  books  and  by  observation  as  few  men  do.  Being 
deep  himself,  he  read  deep  books  and  no  one  could 
be  with  him  an  hour  and  not  learn  something.  He 


HOME  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  283 

understood  finance,  social  and  political  science,  and 
international  trade,  to  a  degree  which  would  rank  him 
among  the  Statesmen  of  our  time,  and  he  frequently 
spoke  and  wrote  upon  these  subjects.  He  understood 
the  French  language,  and  learned  it  as  late  as  when 
I  was  a  grown  boy,  and  I  remember  his  learning  his 
lessons  at  home  at  night  even  as  I  did  mine,  or  tried 
to  do.  He  was  familiar  with  mechanics  and  the 
natural  sciences. 

My  father  had  a  sacred  regard  for  his  credit,  which 
he  held  more  dearly  than  his  life,  and  he  maintained 
it  always  at  the  highest  level.  No  man  in  Chicago 
had  a  higher  personal  credit  than  he.  He  believed 
more  in  credit  founded  upon  personal  character  than 
upon  accumulation.  As  a  bank  director  he  would  rather 
loan  $50,000  to  a  man  not  worth  $25,000  but  whose 
character  was  high  class,  than  to  loan  $25,000  to  a 
man  worth  $50,000  whose  integrity  was  questionable, 
for  he  felt  that  the  element  of  honor  vouchsafed 
greater  security  to  the  paper  of  the  one,  than  did  the 
collateral  which  was  wholly  material,  to  that  of  the 
other.  He  was  one  of  the  really  great  business  men 
that  Chicago  has  produced,  and  his  influence  and 
reputation  as  such,  founded  upon  rigid  honesty,  ability 
and  good  judgment,  has  extended  to  all  the  great 
grain  growing  districts  of  the  West,  and  the  com- 
mercial marts  of  this  country  and  of  England. 

My  father  was  a  man  of  most  tremendous  energy, 
backed  by  a  nerve  and  will  of  iron  against  which  noth- 
ing could  prevail.  Then  coupled  with  this  was  a  great 


284         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

mentality  and  an  ambition  which  never  grew  less  while 
he  lived,  together  with  a  cool  head,  and  self  possession, 
poise  and  level  headedness.  No  wonder  that  such  a 
combination  of  endowments  made  him  the  largest 
grain  merchant  in  the  world.  No  wonder  that  out  of 
these  came  the  man  who  was  destined  to  destroy  the 
pernicious  bucket-shops,  to  be  the  World's  Fair  Presi- 
dent, and  to  fight  the  vicious  element  of  Chicago  at 
the  head  of  the  Civic  Federation  in  that  City.  Great 
executive  capacity  and  courage  and  shrewdness  was 
called  for  to  do  these  things,  and  he  had  them.  He 
loomed  up  in  any  situation  where  he  happened  to  be 
thrown  and  generally  dominated  it.  He  was  high- 
strung  and  nervous.  The  town  clock  could  be  cor- 
rectly set  by  observance  of  his  habits.  At  any  appoint- 
ment or  board  meeting  he  would  arrive  on  the  hour, 
minute  and  second,  like  Phineas  Fogg,  and  it  is  said 
that  bank  directors  would  set  their  watches  by  his 
coming.  He  often  said  of  himself  that  "he  lost  more 
time  by  being  prompt  than  in  any  other  way,"  for  he 
very  often  had  to  lose  time  while  waiting  for  the  others 
to  come. 

This  father  of  mine  would  have  reached  the  top 
in  any  path  in  life,  where  chance  might  have  thrown 
him  in  the  beginning.  I  have  often  thought  that  with 
such  splendid  material  at  her  disposal,  Fate  should 
have  pointed  out  to  him  a  different  trail  than  that 
which  led  to  the  Board  of  Trade.  How  incomparably 
grand  would  he  have  been  as  a  lawyer  with  all  his 
indomitable  will  and  fighting  qualities,  his  gift  of 


HOME  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  285 

language  and  debate,  his  high  sense  of  justice  and  his 
power  of  mind !  I  know  he  would  have  made  a  great 
engineer,  for  while  associated  with  me,  I  saw  it  in 
his  quick  comprehension  of  natural  laws  and  of  their 
application  to  engineering  problems.  His  power  of 
imagination  was  full,  complete  and  vivid,  and  he  had 
only  to  glance  at  a  plan  on  paper  to  have  it  at  once 
loom  up  and  take  form  in  his  mind,  and  he  could  then 
discuss  the  features  of  the  thing  to  be  accomplished 
as  well  as  though  it  stood  before  him  in  its  final  and 
completed  physical  shape.  He  could  have  managed 
a  great  railroad  system,  and  done  it  with  a  master 
hand.  He  would  have  known  where  to  build  in  order  to 
entice  the  traffic.  His  instinct  would  have  pointed  out 
to  him  where  the  country  was  to  grow  and  where 
the  trade  and  commerce  conditions  were  such  as  to 
induce  cities  and  towns  to  rise.  In  this  way,  he  was 
a  veritable  prophet,  as  demonstrated  by  what  he  fore- 
told of  Seattle  when  I  first  went  there,  many  years 
before  she  came  to  her  present  prestige  and  import- 
ance. And  then  he  would  have  known  how  to  serve 
these  towns  best,  and  how  to  be  just  and  fair  in  dealing 
with  his  patrons  in  them.  And  he  would  never  have 
juggled  the  property  under  his  direction  for  his  pri- 
vate interest  or  that  of  his  particular  friends,  nor 
would  he  have  kept  his  stockholders  in  ignorance  of 
their  road's  performances  and  possibilities,  nor  would 
he  have  turned  official  information  to  his  private 
account,  nor  made  money  out  of  any  property  sold 
to  any  railroad  in  his  charge  nor  fleeced  his  stock- 


286         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

holders  by  any  other  modern  method.  No,  not  he! 
That  would  to  him  have  been  dishonorable  and  un- 
thinkable. 

He  would  have  made  a  soldier,  and  in  a  crisis  a 
Napoleon.  He  was  brave, — he  had  no  fear  of  any- 
thing. Military  tactics  and  strategy  were  to  his  lik- 
ing, which  facts  his  early  life  demonstrated  in  his 
study  of  Napoleon.  He  would  rather  fight  than  eat. 
He  was  a  natural  leader  and  commander,  and  as  I 
know  to  my  boyhood  sorrow,  a  rigid  disciplinarian. 
He  possessed  intense  patriotism.  No  compromise 
would  he  have  given  nor  asked,  and  surrender  he 
would  not  have  known  the  meaning  of.  And  then 
withal,  he  was  engineer  enough  to  comprehend  the 
relation  between  topographical  features,  the  mathe- 
matics of  projectiles  and  distances,  and  the  construc- 
tions incidental  to  warfare.  He  believed  in  obedience 
to  duly  constituted  authority  and  to  the  law,  and  he 
was  a  stickler  upon  rules  and  regulations  as  accepted 
and  applied  to  business,  household  matters  or  to  play. 
In  our  home  there  never  rang  a  bell  to  call  the  family 
to  their  meals,  but  when  the  chimes  clock  began  to 
toll  the  hour  prescribed  for  each  meal,  the  family 
would  then  begin  to  move  from  all  corners  of  the  house 
and  would  take  their  seats  at  the  table  just  as  the  last 
note  struck.  He  was  a  slave  to  golf  and  did  it  accord- 
ing to  the  "rules."  He  gave  me  my  first  lesson  at  the 
Highland  Park  links,  by  first  dissertating  at  length 
upon  the  science  of  the  game,  and  the  proper  form  of 
playing  it.  Then  he  proceeded  to  demonstrate  how 


HOME  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  287 

it  was  done  as  an  artist  would  do  it,  by  holding  the 
club  just  so,  standing  just  here  or  there  with  feet 
mathematically  placed  just  so,  with  eyes  on  the  ball, 
and  with  club  gracefully  poised  high  in  the  air,  then 
sweeping  it  downward  and  towards  the  ball  in  a  true 
cycloidal  curve  with  the  aim  and  precision  of  a  genius, 
and — tearing  up  a  clod  of  turf  instead  of  striking  the 
ball.  "Darn  it,"  he  said,  "it  don't  do  me  any  good  to 
play  golf, — I  get  so  mad."  And  then  with  a  clear 
explanation  of  how  to  do  it  "in  form"  in  my  mind,  and 
an  actual  and  partial  demonstration  of  its  execution, 
I  took  my  place  at  the  first  tee  of  my  life,  quickly 
swung  the  club  in  the  true  wildwest  fashion  of  Puget 
Sound,  while  Father  hastened  to  interrupt  by  calling  to 
me  to  correct  my  lack  of  style  and  disobedience  to  the 
rules : — but  the  ball  had  taken  flight  and  sailed  like  an 
arrow  shot  from  a  bow,  almost  to  the  border  of  the 
distant  green.  "Well,"  he  said  "you  did  it  all  right, 
but  you  didn't  do  it  right."  And  I  have  never  again 
done  that  trick  since. 

An  admirer  of  his  in  telling  me  of  what  he  could 
do,  said,  "He  could  do  anything  that  any  man  could 
do,"  and  that  "he  would  have  made  an  abler  and  bet- 
ter President  of  the  United  States  than  many  who 
have  held  that  high  office," — and  those  who  know  his 
true  measure  will  I  think  endorse  that  statement.  I 
had  not  thought  of  him  as  of  presidential  size,  but  I 
do  now.  But  he  had  no  political  ambition.  Some  there 
are  who  say  he  did  have,  but  that  it  was  set  aside  to 
meet  the  requirements  of  his  invalid  wife.  He  was, 


288         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

however,  an  impossible  man  to  fit  into  modern  political 
machinery  and  methods.  The  Board  of  Trade  element 
recognized  his  fitness  for  high  public  service,  and 
strongly  urged  him  for  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  at 
one  time,  but  he  discouraged  it.  At  another  time  also, 
a  movement  was  growing  to  make  him  Mayor  of 
Chicago  in  order  to  stop  the  public  thieving  and  cor- 
ruption, and  this  he  also  vetoed.  What  a  houseclean- 
ing  there  would  have  been,  had  he  been  turned  loose 
upon  such  a  situation !  It  is  just  as  well  for  him  that 
it  was  not  done  for  he  probably  would  have  been  shot. 
He  brought  with  him  to  each  new  field  of  duty  the 
same  ability,  fidelity,  honesty,  and  hard  work  that 
always  characterized  him  in  any  other  field  of  duty 
which  he  may  have  previously  taken  upon  him- 
self. For  work  he  had  an  unlimited  capacity.  It  was 
work,  work,  strenuous  work,  which  laid  the  founda- 
tion of  his  success  in  life.  It  was  work  with  him,  not 
solely  to  obtain  a  given  objective,  but  to  attain  that 
objective  in  a  manner  above  reproach  and  such  as  his 
conscience  would  approve  of.  To  him,  success  in  life 
meant  nothing,  unless  the  means  of  that  end  had  been 
at  all  times  honorable,  honest  and  above  reproach. 

He  was  the  living  expression  of  persistency.  There 
was  no  let  up  in  his  mind  in  anything  that  he  started 
out  to  do.  He  showed  this  well  in  our  fight  with  the 
E.  Company  and  M.  &  N.  when  they  sought  to  destroy 
us  in  the  West.  It  was  because  of  this  element  of  his 
character  largely  that  he  was  installed  in  the  Presi- 
dencv  of  the  World's  Fair.  It  was  because  of  this 


HOME  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  289 

attribute  and  his  constant  belief  in  high  prices  of  farm 
products  as  being  helpful  to  the  farmer  and  as  the  basis 
of  national  prosperity  that  he  was  always  an  invari- 
able bull  on  wheat.  He  never  could  see  the  opposite 
side  of  the  situation  and  never  took  that  stand.  He 
characterized  the  bear  operator  as  a  "Pirate  of  com- 
merce." 

Then  there  was  the  gentle  side  to  Father's  charac- 
ter, and  the  true  nobility  that  often  goes  with  the 
rugged  and  determined  front  which  strong  men  like 
him  present  to  the  world.  He  loved  tenderly  those 
who  were  near  and  dear  to  him,  and  he  radiated  with 
it  in  his  last  years  a  sweetness  of  temperament  more 
often  found  in  a  woman.  He  was  deeply  religious, 
and  God  fearing  and  he  grew  more  so  as  he 
came  into  the  evening  of  his  life.  He  believed 
in  acting  out  his  religion  and  Christian  spirit 
in  his  everyday  business  and  home  life,  for  it 
would  have  been  mockery  and  sham  and  a  lie 
as  he  viewed  things  to  be  a  regular  churchman 
wearing  the  cloak  of  one  who  professes  Christian 
principles  under  which  to  show  himself  on  Sundays, 
and  to  forget  the  golden  rule  and  ten  commandments 
during  the  rest  of  the  time.  So  he  went  to  Church,  not 
as  a  confirmed  member  of  any,  although  a  contri- 
buting supporter,  but  to  hear  good  music  and  a 
scholarly  sermon,  which  to  him  was  simply  a  lecture 
on  a  biblical  topic  by  a  recognized  authority  upon  the 
subject.  He  was  the  opposite  of  being  a  hypocrite  in 
all  things.  He  was  good  and  pure  in  living,  thought 


290         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

and  speech.  He  never  indulged  in  profane  language, 
not  even  when  his  temper  got  well  heated, — and  even 
when  he  said  "darn,"  he  always  looked  as  though  he 
wished  he  hadn't  said  it,  or  as  if  he  thought  he  might 
as  well  have  said  the  real  thing. 

He  was  impulsive — romantic,  and  out  of  business 
hours  could  be  playful  as  a  boy  when  the  environments 
warranted  it.  He  loved  flowers  and  birds  and  he 
breathed  inspiration  from  the  mountains  and  trees, 
and  all  the  things  of  beauty  and  wonder  that  Nature 
has  afforded  us.  He  was  a  handsome  man  and 
immaculate  in  his  dress  and  personal  appearance.  His 
face  beamed  in  his  happier  moods  and  even  in  repose 
it  radiated  light.  His  personality  was  magnetic  to 
his  friends  and  forbidding  to  his  enemies.  He  pos- 
sessed unusual  wit.  He  had  the  artistic  temperament 
strongly  developed  and  showed  it  in  his  fondness  for 
beautiful  things  in  general  but  more  particularly  for 
fine  pictures,  noble  architecture  and  good  books,  and 
in  his  keen  love  for  music.  He  was  altruistic,  humane, 
and  charitable,  and  prodigal  in  his  generosity  without 
being  ostentatious  about  it.  Like  many  great  natures 
he  was  a  modest  gentleman  with  poise  and  dignity. 
He  was  a  man  who  did  things,  and  in  world  building 
did  more  than  his  part.  He  had  strong  friends  and  of 
course  bitter  enemies,  for  such  a  nature  necessarily 
attracts  both.  But  his  enemies  respected  him  as  much 
as  did  his  friends.  He  was  positively  loyal,  true,  and 
steadfast  to  his  friends  whether  up  or  down,  and  he 
was  pronounced  against  his  enemies.  In  the  great 


HOME  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  291 

church  where  there  assembled  those  who  had  come 
to  pay  their  last  tribute  before  his  lifeless  form,  there 
were  those  also  assembled  there  who  in  bitterness  had 
crossed  swords  with  him  in  life  and  been  worsted  in 
the  doing  so.  The  monument  that  we  reared  for  him 
in  Graceland  Cemetery,  tells  in  itself  to  the  stranger 
passing  by  the  character  of  the  man  whose  memory 
it  honors,  for  it  is  a  single  solid  block  of  granite, 
rugged  and  simple  in  outline,  without  display,  but 
strong  and  imposing  in  aspect,  and  speaking  only  a 
single  word, — the  name  which  he  has  made  it  an 
honor  to  bear. 

It  is  true  of  mankind,  that  all  come  into  the  world 
destined  to  meet  the  eternal  warfare  which  Nature 
and  Mankind  itself  impose  upon  them.  As  soon  as  we 
are  born  the  forces  of  nature  begin  to  destroy  through 
the  agencies  of  disease,  exposure  and  accident,  the 
mortal  part  of  us,  and  man  himself  begins  to  tear 
down  and  destroy  the  perfect  soul  with  which  each 
child  has  been  endowed  at  its  creation.  It  is  only 
the  fittest  who  survive  in  body,  mind  and  character, 
for  as  we  go  onward  in  our  lives,  that  which  is  mortal 
in  us  begins  to  depreciate  after  the  meridian  of  life 
has  been  passed,  and  the  final  end  of  it  is  death  and 
dissolution.  But  the  immortal  feature  of  our  being 
lives  on  in  a  greater  or  lesser  sphere  as  we  determine 
it  for  ourselves,  there  being  no  termination  of  it,  but 
rather  a  process  beginning  with  life  itself,  of  evolution, 
growth  and  transformation,  and  then  transition. 
Good  natures  therefore  as  the  years  glide  by,  come 


292         LIFE  OF  WILLIAM  TAYLOR  BAKER 

nearer  to  their  final  goal  of  glory.  They  are  better  than 
their  original  elements,  and  rising  higher  than  they 
have  stood,  become  grander  and  more  magnificent, 
like  a  tall  and  stately  tree,  which  from  a  seedling  in 
poor  soil  comes  finally  into  a  tower  of  beauty,  strength 
and  inspiration,  reaching  heavenwards  as  it  grows. 
Even  so  it  may  be  told  of  my  father,  that  he  sprang 
from  the  soil  of  poverty,  that  he  grew  in  broader  and 
higher  manhood  and  soul  character  through  the  years 
of  strife,  until  coming  into  the  autumn  of  his  life, 
transformed  from  the  less  perfect  being  of  the  past, 
he  had  only  to  do  as  he  did, — lie  down  in  a  peaceful 
sleep  on  earth  in  the  evening  of  a  happy  day,  from 
which  the  awakening  came  in  immortality  in  the  life 
beyond. 

Thus  lived  and  died  William  Taylor  Baker.  Who 
can  say  how  far  reaching  has  been  his  influence,  or 
in  what  measure  he  has  left  his  impress  upon  the 
world?  There  may  be  those  who  never  knew  him 
except  at  long  range,  but,  who  knowing  him  to  the 
degree  that  such  a  public  character  is  likely  to  be 
known,  took  their  inspiration  from  him,  and  made  him 
their  guide  for  better  living  and  for  greater  achieve- 
ment. We,  unconsciously,  in  our  youth  particularly, 
look  up  to  such  a  man,  and  accept  him  as  our  model 
to  pattern  after  and  grow  up  to.  So  strong  a  manhood 
as  his,  therefore,  undoubtedly  drew  unto  itself  the 
approbative  attention  of  many  who  saw  in  him  the 
true  ideals  to  which  their  better  and  more  ambitious 
natures  would  lead  them;  and  so  all  unconsciously, 


THE   BAKER   LOT   IN   GRACELAND. 


HOME  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  293 

he,  like  other  men  of  equally  sterling  caliber,  radi- 
ated the  strength  and  virtue  within  him,  to  be  absorbed 
and  expanded  again  by  those  whose  natures  he  thus 
touched.  The  good  that  he  may  thus  have  done  shall 
never  be  known  perhaps,  but  we,  who  were  close  to 
him  and  knew  him  through  and  through,  found  there 
an  able,  honest,  upright,  brave  and  conscientious  man, 
who  did  his  duty  as  he  knew  it,  and  with  all  the 
strength  and  purpose  at  his  command.  What  more 
could  be  asked  of  any  man  ? 

THE  END. 


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